Mahmoud Abbas camp said concerned by low voter turnout

Palestinians were casting their votes in the Palestinian Authority leadership race Sunday, in an election that is expected to see Fatah candidate Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen) replace the late Yasser Arafat as chairman.

Polling stations opened 7 A.M. Sunday and will close at 9 P.M. Initial returns are expected Sunday night, with final results due Monday.

The results of two exit polls were due to be released shortly after the polling stations close.

Voters trickled into stations early Sunday, and activity picked up in many areas by midmorning. Voting went smoothly in most areas.

By 3 P.M. local time, some 30 percent of Palestinian eligible to vote had cast their ballot, Army Radio report. Abbas' campaign team was, however, reportedly worried by the low voter turnout.

The polls were ordered to stay open an extra two hours until 9 P.M. following confusion at East Jerusalem post offices, where East Jerusalem residents were casting their ballots.

Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, one of 800 international monitors of the first Palestinian chairmanship election since 1996, said it appeared Israel was keeping to its promise to ease the passage of Palestinians at military checkpoints.

"There is no [Israeli] intimidation I have seen," Carter told reporters after visiting checkpoints near Jerusalem.

One of the leaders of the official U.S. observer team, Sen. Joseph R. Biden (D-Delaware), said Sunday morning that the elections appeared "well-organized."

"This could be an election back in the States so far," he said.

The election, the outcome of which has been universally expected since the list of candidates was drawn up, is being closely monitored by thousands of foreign and local observers.

Abbas said Sunday morning that the elections were going smoothly, showing that the Palestinians are moving toward democracy.

"The elections are going very well and this proves that the Palestinian people are moving towards democracy," Abbas said after casting his ballot in the Muqata headquarters in the West Bank city of Ramallah, under a portrait of Arafat. "There are obstacles, but the determination of the people is stronger."

"We heard that there is a high turnout, especially by women, and this is a very good thing," Abbas said.

Palestinian police officer Mohammed Juma was one of the first voters at the Jalil school in Gaza City. He turned his pistol in at the entrance before casting his vote for Abbas.

"I believe he is the only one capable of taking us to the safe side of this ocean of conflict," he said.

Shalom: War on terror should begin day after electionForeign Minister Silvan Shalom said Sunday it was in Israel's interest for the elections to go smoothly, saying this would enable the newly elected Palestinian leader to fight terrorism immediately.

Israel hopes the elections do not hit any snags, "so that starting from tomorrow, the new Palestinian leadership will be able to do what it is required to do," Shalom told reporters in remarks broadcast on Israel Radio. "I think that the leader who is elected will have to wage a genuine struggle against terror immediately and carry out reforms [in the PA]."

"Of course, we expect a new, different Palestinian leadership that will be prepared to move in the direction of peace," Shalom said.

Israel is already preparing for the renewal of negotiations with the Palestinian leadership and a meeting between Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and the Palestinian chairman-elect.

The Sharon government regards the election of Abu Mazen as a certainty, and the formula currently on the table is that "Palestinian prisoners will be released and additional restrictions will be lifted, in return for a [Palestinian] war against the Qassam rockets."

Israel has already prepared a list of steps that Abu Mazen can take against the launching of the rockets from the Gaza Strip, including the closing down by Palestinian forces of the workshops where the rockets are made, using intelligence information provided by Israel.

"Abu Mazen's test will first and foremost be the fight against the Qassams, and we will demand that he undertake very specific steps that are in his power to carry out; it will be the first subject on which we will meet," a senior government source said.

According to sources in the Prime Minister's Office, only after Abu Mazen shows his seriousness in fighting terrorism will it be possible to know the degree of the coordination with the Palestinian Authority that Israel will be willing to assume during the implementation of the disengagement plan.

Meanwhile, Palestinian officials announced Saturday that a parliamentary election would be held on July 17.

Security forces on alert as polls openIsraeli security forces were on high alert as voting stations opened across the territories, Israel Radio reported.

The Israel Defense Forces has halted operations across the West Bank, excepting the villages around the area of Friday's attack in which an off-duty soldier was shot dead and four others were wounded.

As international election experts fanned out to monitor the ballot, IDF soldiers continued to inspect the identity cards and packages of Palestinians waiting in line at checkpoints at the entrances to West Bank cities, witnesses said.

However, Israel has maintained that it has made great efforts to facilitate the passage of the Palestinian voters, but warned also that it will not hesitate to clamp down in the event of violence against Israelis.

The warning was passed on to the Palestinians through the senior foreign election observer, former U.S. president Jimmy Carter.

"Major checkpoints are still in place; there was never any intention to remove them. It's obvious they must stay in place for security reasons. Terrorist threats still have to be dealt with," said an army spokesman.

The United States is also waiting to see the outcome of the election in the territories and the developments in the Palestinian Authority, prior to formulating a clear policy.

On the other hand, countries of the European Union, with the possible exception of Britain, are pressing the U.S. and Israel to begin negotiations for a final settlement on the basis of the road map peace plan. The EU is expecting to broaden its involvement in the region and is hoping that with the death of Arafat, it will be possible to move toward the latter stages of the implementation of the road map without the interim stages.

'Problematic' voter registryPrior to the opening of polls Sunday morning, there were growing concerns that the official election register is "problematic" and may be used as cause for a multitude of legal challenges to the final results.

The concerns raised by senior Palestinian officials and foreign monitors center on the official number of eligible voters, which the register has as 1,757,756. The observers have noted that the register is not updated and may be bloated because some potential voters have been counted more than once.

The problem emerged when the official election register was completed during the final quarter of 2004. According to observers, the final register is described as being "professional" and up to "international standards."

However, the figure of 1,092,407, voters was "too low" because of a relatively low turn-out for registration, stemming from numerous logistical and security reasons.

Three weeks ago, the Palestinian Legislative Council amended the election law and called for the inclusion of data from the population census. The concern was that the Palestinian election committee was only including 72 percent of all eligible voters.

The process added a total of 662,883 additional voters to the new election register.

However, the population census was not only outdated but also inaccurate, again due to various logistical reasons that prevented an accurate count.

This in turn raised the possibility that at least several thousands of voters may be registered to vote more than once, thereby distorting the election results and serving critics of the Palestinian Authority to allege the invalidity of the poll.

One of the senior international observers in the elections said that "the whole election process depends on the efficiency of the indelible ink with which all those that have cast their ballots will be marked in order to ensure that they only vote once. This ink, which often solves serious difficulties, has been proven to be a problematic element in other elections, such as those in Afghanistan and in Africa, because it can be wiped off in an hour or two."

	Interim Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas casting his vote in Ramallah on Sunday for the Palestinian Authority chairman. (Reuters)