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United Nations diplomats are warning that Iraq's first democratic election will be held without wide-scale international monitoring. The UN says it cannot observe the January 30 poll because it played a role in setting up the elections, and no other international organisation has stepped in to offer assistance. The absence of international monitoring could undermine confidence in the results of elections that are already threatened by widespread voter intimidation and the boycott of Sunni Arab parties. But one UN official said there would be sufficient scrutiny by local party observers and domestic non-governmental organisations. “It's not essential to have international election observers,” said Carlos Valenzuela, the UN's Iraq election expert. A Canada-based umbrella group of electoral experts, the International Mission for Iraqi Elections, was established in December to help assess the process, but insists it is not a monitoring mission. “Monitoring is a big problem. There won't be any international observation mechanism,” said one UN diplomat. “The UN is not willing. No one is willing. No one wants to send their people there.” Even the number of Iraqis expected to oversee the process was “less than expected or needed”. The diplomat described IMIE as a “last-minute” initiative, which will send experts to Jordan and Baghdad's green zone “to provide a kind of out-of-country monitoring mission”. [more]