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GRAND AYATOLLAH ALI
AL-SISTANI: Although not running for election,
Iraq's top Shiite cleric has issued an edict
describing voting as a ''religious duty.'' Al-Sistani,
75, has great influence in the majority Shiite
community and has opposed anti-American violence.
With the loyalty of most Shiite clerics and many
tribal leaders, the Iranian-born grand ayatollah has
used his popularity to sway the political process
toward assuring Shiite domination of the future
government.
ABDEL-AZIZ AL-HAKIM: Shiite cleric and leader
of the key Shiite political organization, the
Supreme Council of the Islamic Revolution in Iraq.
Opposed Saddam Hussein from exile in Iran before
returning after the U.S.-led invasion and serving on
the Iraq Governing Council. He and al-Sistani lead
the United Iraqi Alliance, which is widely expected
to dominate the election.
AYAD ALLAWI: Interim prime minister
considered a moderate with a reputation for
toughness in dealing with the multiple insurgencies
gripping Iraq. The 60-year-old Shiite physician, who
leads a group of candidates called The Iraqi List,
spent three decades in exile and has a long history
of working with the U.S. government. A former member
of Saddam's Baath Party, his wealthy family was
close to the royal family that ruled before Saddam
took power.
IBRAHIM AL-JAAFARI: Interim vice president
and the main spokesman for the Islamic Dawa Party,
which waged a bloody campaign against Saddam's
regime in the late 1970s. Saddam crushed the
campaign in 1982 and Dawa based itself in Iran. The
party is a member of the United Iraqi Alliance. Al-Jaafari,
a Shiite who was born in 1947, is a general
practitioner.
GHAZI AL-YAWER: Interim president, a largely
ceremonial post. He is a prominent Sunni member of
the Shammar tribe, which includes Shiite clans and
is one of the largest tribes in the Persian Gulf
region. A civil engineer born in Mosul, al-Yawer,
45, studied in Saudi Arabia and at Georgetown
University in the United States. He heads the Iraqis
Party.
ADNAN PACHACHI: Foreign minister in the
government toppled by Saddam's Baath Party in a 1968
coup and a member of the post-U.S. invasion Iraqi
National Council. Pachachi, 81, leads a group of
candidates called the Assembly of Independent
Democrats. A prominent secular Sunni, he is seen as
a possible compromise figure to lead a future
government.
NASEER KAMEL AL-CHADERCHI: Sunni lawyer,
businessman and landowner who leads the National
Democratic Party. A member of the former Iraqi
Governing Council, he is the son of Kamel al-Chaderchi,
who played a leading role in Iraq's democratic
development until 1968, when the Baath Party seized
power.
JALAL TALABANI: Sunni Kurd and leader of the
Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, one of two key
northern Kurdish parties. Born in 1934, he joined
the Kurdistan Democratic Party as a teenager and
then founded the PUK in 1957. He and KDP leader
Massoud Barzani are running for office in a joint
group of candidates, the Kurdish Alliance List.
MASSOUD BARZANI: Sunni Kurd and leader of the
Kurdistan Democratic Party, founded in 1946 by his
father. Barzani, 56, helped negotiate a short-lived
autonomy agreement with Iraq's government in 1970
that ended nine years of fighting. He took over the
party leadership when his father died in 1979 and
has survived two assassination attempts.
AHMAD CHALABI: Secular Shiite banker and
one-time Pentagon confidante who led the Iraqi
National Congress, an umbrella for groups that
included Iraqi exiles, Kurds and Shiites. Chalabi,
58, who left Iraq as a teen, fell out of favor with
Washington last year after claims he passed
intelligence information to Iran. He is running with
the United Iraqi Alliance.
HUSSAIN AL-SHAHRISTANI: One of six figures
chosen by al-Sistani to draw up the United Iraqi
Alliance's candidate list. Al-Shahristani is a
nuclear scientist whose refusal to work in Saddam's
nuclear program led to his 1979 jailing. He escaped
in 1991. Educated and married in Canada, he worked
for human rights organizations in Iran and London.
ADIL ABDUL-MAHDI: Iraq's current minister of
finance and a leading politician in the powerful
Shiite Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in
Iraq. Born in 1942, he is the French-educated son of
a respected Shiite cleric who was a Cabinet minister
in Iraq's monarchy. Running with United Iraqi
Alliance.
HAMID MAJID MOUSSA: Economist, leader of the
Iraqi Communist Party since 1993 and a member of the
former Iraqi Governing Council. A Shiite, Moussa
left Iraq in 1978 and returned in 1983 to continue
his political activities against Saddam's regime.
Draws support from urban Shiites and Kurds. .
© 2005 The Associated Press. All rights reserved
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