Iraqis demand right to know candidates

More than 1,000 demonstrators took to the streets across Iraq on Saturday against plans to enact a controversial closed voting system which does not name candidates standing for office. The protests in Baghdad, the northern city of Kirkuk and the southern port of Basra came after a call by Iraq's top Shiite cleric Grand Ayatollah Ali Husseini al-Sistani for MPs to adopt an open process for the parliamentary elections in January. In central Baghdad, several hundred protesters gathered at Firdos Square, carrying Iraqi flags and placards reading "Closed Lists Strengthen Sectarianism and Racism" and in support of Sistani's stance. "Seeing the names of candidates is important -- we have to know for whom we are going to vote," Makki Awad, an Iraqi actor at the demonstration, told AFP. The central issue in dispute is the plan of MPs to adopt a closed voting that would list parties contesting the election without disclosing the individuals vying to take up seats in parliament.