Iraqi Elections in Kurdistan :

Because of the nature of my work, I could not report about the elections on the day. I have collected photos, reports, interviews, and results in this post from different forums and news websites as well as blogs.
I would like to thank all these forums and blogs and websites.

Photos:
Election Photos 1
Election photos 2
Election Celeberation photos 3
Election photos 3 (protests by an Islamic Kurdish party)
Election Celeberations in Netherlands photos 4
Photos of Kurds participating in the Iraqi elections 15.12.2005
Photos of Kurds participating in the Iraqi elections 14.12.2005
Election photos 12.12.05
More Holland photos

Results:
The elementary results of the Iraqi elections in Kurdistan
Iraqi Vote Update from Global Voices (Delal)
Kurdistani Alliance sweeps 46% of London votes
Iraqi election: Kurdistan alliance list is on top of EU countries
Iraqis vote, celebrate near Washington, DC
About 95 percent of Kurdish Amedi took part in the election
Kurdistan President votes using Arabic ballet box
Kurds win in Kirkuk - Hiwa

Removable Ink ?!
I did not participate. But fraud and cheating was very wide across the whole of Iraq. My friend who works in Baghdad told me that he and his friends voted several times because the purple ink could be washed off with any cleaning liquid.
Another way to remove the ink was to dip your finger in oil (cooking oil, car oil etc) before entering the polling center, then washing your hands with soap was enough to get it off.

Lack of ballot papers across Iraq ?!!
One funny thing happened on the day is that we heard that ballot papers run out across Iraq. An election official came on a popular radio and said we have sent out ballot papers for every single voter to the polling stations. That is about 15 million ballot papers. How can they run out ?
Well they can. This is what happened. Every single party started to fill out papers by themselves.
A friend of mine went to vote..He is of the religious type and he wanted to vote for the Kurdistan Islamic Union. He is a funny guy he always makes jokes. This is how he told me about his experience:
"I went to vote at about 3.30 pm. A guy eating an apple and a few election officials (women and men) were dancing on the other side to some loud Kurdish dance music)...they told me voting is over...My friend told them "Look it is 3.30...voting is until 5.."...they told him "oh don't worry..we voted for you"..
My friend gets angry and shouts "Voted for me ?! Who told you to vote for me ?? They told him "We voted for you for 730..we will win..come and dance with us"..my friend (who does not look religious at all) told them I don't want to vote for 730..I want to vote for what I believe in...

the election officials become confused and they give him a ballot and let him vote...Later when he finishes, they ask him who did you vote for..He says that is private...they give him an apple and tell him not to tell anyone !!!

This happened all over Iraq. In Rumadi and other Sunni areas, tribal militiants were in charge of security and not the independent Iraqi army !!!

But despite all of these violations, it is not too bad...Better could be done in the future.