Iraq polls may worsen sectarian tension

Tomorrow's poll for a national assembly is vital to the US plan to transform Iraq from dictatorship to democracy, 22 months after an invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein.

"It has the potential to make things worse, precisely because it will accentuate communal differences," said Robert Springborg, director of the Middle East Institute at London's School of Oriental and African Studies.

The election is taking place in a security vacuum, with Iraqi state forces unable to check crime and lawlessness even in areas relatively untouched by anti-US violence, said Toby Dodge, an Iraq expert at Queen Mary, University of London.

"Democracy amid anarchy is a difficult trick to pull off," he said.

Even US officials do not suggest the election will halt the fierce Sunni-led insurgency that has gripped parts of Iraq, foiled reconstruction efforts and forced Washington to cast about for a credible exit strategy for its bloodied troops.

Insurgents, mainly Baathist nationalists linking up with local and foreign Muslim militants in the Sunni heartlands of central Iraq, believe they can outlast America.

Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, al-Qaeda's leader in Iraq, has declared war on an "infidel" election he says is a plot to hand power to Iraq's long-oppressed majority Shias.

With most Sunni parties boycotting the election, saying it cannot be fair while US troops occupy Iraq and violence rages, the result may swing disproportionate representation to the Shias and Kurds who suffered most under Saddam's rule.

Shias, themselves split down religious-secular lines, feel on the brink of political power at last. Minority Kurds are determined to cling to hard-won autonomy in the north.