Iraqi parl. holds decisive election law vote session Sat.

BAGHDAD / IraqiNews.com: The Iraqi parliament will hold a decisive session on Saturday to vote over the parliamentary election law, delayed over differences among legislators over the status of the disputed oil-rich province of Kirkuk. Today’s session will be convened after an agreement was reached on Thursday on a new proposal that was the outcome of several ones by the UN, the Sunni Iraqi Accord Front (IAF), the Shiite United Iraqi Alliance (UIA) and Arab and Turkmen representatives of Kirkuk. The proposal envisages that parliamentary elections would be held in Kirkuk as scheduled on condition that a panel would be set up in one year to verify the voters’ registers and the holding of re-elections if excesses proved to have gone beyond 15%, in addition to granting Arab and Turkmen two compensatory seats. The problem of Kirkuk represents a stumbling stone before the adoption of the parliamentary election law, scheduled to be held on January 16, 2010, after political blocs were up to their ears in tough wrangling that did not help reach an agreement on the way elections should be held in the disputed province. AmR (P) 1