BAGHDAD, Dec. 11 (UPI) -- The Iraqi electoral commission says it has found irregularities in voter registration in the oil city of Kirkuk.
The announcement comes just days before Iraqis head to the polls.
The commission said experts conducting an audit of voter lists found there had been an unexpected surge in voter registration in the area. When the experts scrutinized the voter registration forms, the commission said some were missing signatures and others had more than one signature.
Adel al-Lami, the director general of the Iraqi electoral commission, told The New York Times that in his view the voter registration irregularities were technical errors and not politically motivated.
The election commission said Kirkuk had an average 45 percent increase in voter registration across the region, compared with an average 8.19 percent increase across Iraq, the newspaper said.
The commission said it would distribute to polling places a list of names for whom forms had been rejected, and those people would not be allowed to vote.
