"Baghdad votes recount" ordered ...

AP/ here

An Iraqi panel investigating election complaints ordered on Monday a recount of more than 2.5 million votes cast in Baghdad during the March 7 election, agreeing to a demand by Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki that could swing the outcome in his favor.....

The recount was ordered by the Independent High Electoral Commission, a three-member panel that investigates election-related complaints, commission official Hamdia al-Hussaini said.

The order was handed down on the same day that powerful Shiite leader Ammar al-Hakim said he did not see either al-Maliki or Allawi as candidates who could succeed as prime minister because, in his view, they do not have enough support in Iraq or internationally..... "We are talking about a person who should be accepted on a national level," al-Hakim said in the interview at his palatial office in southeast Baghdad. "This is the most important point because the prime minister is not going to be a prime minister of his own party or his political movement, but for all of Iraq. ... On such a basis, we find it's difficult for Mr. Maliki or even Mr. Ayad Allawi to gain the needed acceptance."

Al-Hakim was careful to say he would not reject either candidate...."