Iraqi leaders pressed to avoid Sunni boycott

BAGHDAD, Iraq – U.S. and U.N. officials urged the Shiite-led government Tuesday to reverse last-minute changes to voting rules for a referendum on Iraq’s new constitution and head off a threatened Sunni boycott.

The crisis emerged less than two weeks before the Oct. 15 vote and just a day after the U.N. began distributing 5 million copies of the constitution to voters.

The United Nations sharply criticized the changes – which make it nearly impossible for the Sunni minority to defeat the charter at the polls – and warned that they violate international standards.

Sunni Arab leaders are opposed to the draft constitution that Washington hopes will unite Iraq’s disparate factions and erode support for the country’s bloody insurgency, paving the way to eventually begin withdrawing foreign troops.

But a boycott by the minority would deeply undermine the credibility of the vote and wreck efforts to bring Sunnis into the political process.

Iraq’s Shiite-dominated parliament passed the new rules on Sunday, effectively closing the loophole that would have given the minority a chance of vetoing the constitution by getting a two-thirds “no” vote in three provinces even if it wins majority approval nationwide. Sunni Arabs have a sufficient majority in four of Iraq’s 18 provinces.

The new interpretation of the rules declares that two-thirds of registered voters must vote “no” – not two-thirds of those who actually vote. The interpretation raises the bar to a level almost impossible to meet. In a province of 1 million registered voters, for example, 660,000 would have to vote “no” – even if that many didn’t even come to the polls.

The United Nations cried foul. “Ultimately, this will be a sovereign decision by the Iraqis, spokesman Stephane Dujarric said in New York. “That being said, it is our duty in our role in Iraq to point out when the process does not meet international standards.”

U.N. officials were meeting with members of parliament to reverse the change, Dujarric and Iraqi officials said.

“The decision will be amended depending on what we reach in agreements with the United Nations, Abbas al-Bayati, a Shiite Turkomen lawmaker on the constitutional commission, told the Associated Press. “The U.N. is seeking one interpretation for the word ‘voters,”’ he said.

The Americans were talking separately with the Shiite-led government, said an Iraqi lawmaker, Mahmoud Othman, and an official close to the talks who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the talks.

In Washington, State Department spokesman Sean McCormack declined comment on the U.S. role except to say that the new rules are a topic of discussion among Iraqi authorities.

A senior State Department official said privately that U.S. diplomats have made clear concerns about the rule change in those discussions.

A new version of the rules could be decided as early as today, and it would be put to parliament for a new vote, Othman said.