Iran tries to sabotage Iraq’s election with forged ballots, sources say

Just in case Allah opposes you, stuff the ballots.

Iraqi police yesterday discovered an Iranian tanker truck packed with thousands of forged Iraqi ballots intended to corrupt Iraq’s parliamentary elections tomorrow, The New York Times reports. Three other trucks already had smuggled in more fake ballots, the truck driver reportedly admitted.

[Update: Reuters is reporting that the head of Iraqi border guards and Iraq's Interior Minister checked out the story of forged-ballot trucks, and it is not true.]

[Update 2: CNN is reporting it has "sources" who say the story of the Iranian ballot trucks is true. Apparently, the Sunni Arabs in Iraq want to believe the story, but the Shiite Arabs in Iraq don't. The Sunnis have long alleged undue influence from the Shiites of neighboring Iran.]

As The Times reports:

Agents of the Iranian government are believed to be supporting the two main Shiite political parties here -- the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq and the Dawa Party -- with money and other assistance. Both parties support a strong role for Islam in the Iraqi state; however, compared with the Iranian government itself, which is a strict theocracy, the Iraqi version is relatively moderate.

Likely backlash. Iran apparently knows no bounds in its subversion of freedom and democracy. But this reported arrest at the Iran-Iraq border is likely to produce a backlash in Iraq’s voting booths tomorrow. Iraq’s ultra-religious parties won’t win much.

Iran’s reported fake-vote-smuggling could call into question the June 24 election of that nutcase Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as Iran’s president. Iranian clerics already had disqualified all reformist candidates from running. They also could have faked votes to install the most hateful leader they could find.

Not that Iran’s elections mean anything anyway. The real leader is the Supreme Leader, the Ayatollah Khamenei, a dictator-for-life who can overrule anything Iran’s president or parliament does. But face it, it looks bad to overrule an elected president, so why not “elect” someone who enjoys tyranny? Ayatollah Khamenei wanted Ahmadinejad in there, and he got him.

Iran’s unholy leadership. Iran is a sadly dangerous state. Iran is run by scum.

Iraq will do better, starting tomorrow.

Frank Warner

[Update: Considering the Reuters report, I have to doubt The New York Times report. This may be a case of one person claiming to have heard something from people who didn't know what they were talking about. That said, CNN also has sources supporting The Times report. Keep looking for follow-ups to this story.]

Comments

[Kevin]

I have never seen a liberal make so much sense! If these are the true opinions of liberals, then maybe we can come to agreement.

It's good to see a liberal make so much sense.

[George]

That story was faxed to the NYT from a Kinko's in Abilene, Texas.

[Frank Warner]

Ha!