Edwin Black: Iraq's proposed elections later this month are a lose-lose proposition. Most Sunni and Kurdish political parties have either formally withdrawn or are threatening to because the insurgency has now targeted the entire electoral process. That reality has been driven home daily. Last month, a grenade was tossed into a school with a note warning the building to not become a polling place. Weeks ago, an election commissioner on Baghdad's main street was dragged from his car in broad daylight and shot in the head by men who didn't even mask their faces. (Newsday)

[letter to the editor] David Llewellyn: Future of Iraq after elections. Whilst much of current planning in Iraq seems to place great store on the result of the elections scheduled for the end of January, one can easily envisage the elections having to be postponed, or their results, should they go ahead on time, being anything but helpful. (The Times [UK])

Seumas Milne: This election could plunge Iraq further into the abyss. Rigged polls held under foreign occupation have a notorious pedigree. (The Guardian [UK])

Hani Lazim: George Bush and Tony Blair say the elections scheduled for the end of this month will bring democracy to Iraq. But the democracy they are talking about is the rule of the occupiers under the cover of an elected Iraqi assembly. (Socialist Worker [UK])