Sunni Leaders Attacked In Iraq

"We have set up five polling places in Fallujah and five more today in Ramadi," he said, referring to the two largest cities in Anbar province. "Most of the Sunnis seem eager to participate in the referendum. We met with many leaders of them who came to us and said this."

The Iraqi Islamic Party, the country's largest Sunni political organization, is coordinating registration efforts across the country, according to a spokesman, Sheik Omar Juboury. This week, the party opened a registration office in the Karkh district of Baghdad. "We believe this is an important event to make our voice heard," he said.

Registration drives are underway in predominantly Sunni areas of Iraq where turnout was almost nonexistent in January.

In a meeting of Sunni leaders Sunday in the northern city of Tikrit, religious and militia leaders encouraged people to vote in defiance of a recent insurgent declaration that anyone who participated in the referendum would be killed. After the meeting, registration soared, according to Aqeel Hassan Abdulah, who runs a Tikrit polling center.

But in opposition to such initiatives, Zarqawi-linked insurgents have stepped up their campaign of violence.

In Samarra this month, imams instructed worshipers at Friday prayers to register to vote. A few days later, armed men turned up at the town bazaar passing out leaflets signed by al Qaeda in Iraq that read: "Every faithful should follow the Koran and his prophet and not to follow the infidels and their supporters who are writing the constitution." When police tried to stop them, the gunmen opened fire, killing two officers.

But nowhere will Sunnis' resolve to participate in politics be more tested than in Anbar, a vast desert province where opposition to Iraq's Shiite-led government and to the U.S. military presence is strong and where insurgents still flourish despite a half-dozen Marine operations against them since early May.

In more than a dozen Ramadi mosques, Zarqawi's followers recently posted signs declaring their intent to "strike the referendum centers," calling them "centers of blasphemy" and "a legitimate target for the fire of the holy warriors."

At Thursday's meeting in Ramadi, the provincial capital, Sunni clerics, tribal leaders and politicians gathered to develop a strategy for encouraging participation and securing polling centers.

Asked about the threats by insurgents, one attendee, Mahdi Salih, a former major general in Hussein's army, said people would not be scared away from the polls.

"We are going to risk our lives for the sake of our children if the Zarqawi group insists on its position," he said.

Special correspondents Salih Saif Aldin in Tikrit and Naseer Nouri and Khalid Saffar in Baghdad contributed to this report.