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CNN Saturday Morning News

Polls Close In Iraq; Gunfire Heard As Polls Close; Vote Could Affect U.S. Troops; Sunnis, Shia And Kurds Vote On Constitution; Women's Rights Issues Discussed In Iraq

Aired October 15, 2005 - 10:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

TONY HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: And good morning, everyone, from the CNN Center in Atlanta. I'm Tony Harris.
BETTY NGUYEN, CNN ANCHOR: And I'm Betty Nguyen. It's 5:00 in Iraq, 10:00 a.m. here on the East Coast on this 15th day of October. Much more on Iraq's critical vote in just a moment, but first here are some of the day's top headlines.

This just in to CNN, take a look at these pictures. In Texarkana, Arkansas, hundreds of homes are being evacuated after an explosion involving a train car and a gas tank. It happened just a few hours ago. Officials say a liquid propane gas tank was hit by a Union Pacific train car, exploding in a ball of fire and leaving a cloud of smoke over the city.

Well, after eight straight days, rain in the Northeast is finally beginning to subside. Widespread flooding triggered by all that rain is also beginning to recede somewhat, but minor or even moderate flooding could result from all of the runoff that's left. We'll have a live update in just a few minutes.

Lab tests in Britain confirm that deadly bird flu has reached Europe. Tests on ducks in Romania determined they died of a lethal strain of avian flu. Now, the same strain of bird flu has killed 60 people in Asia.

And to Washington, as we speak the Millions More Movement comes to the National Mall. This event comes on the 10th anniversary of the Million Man March. Organizers intend to focus on the racial and economic divides highlighted by Hurricane Katrina. We'll bring you a live report on the march. That's later this hour.

HARRIS: Pencils down. The voting on a new constitution in Iraq is officially over. As of right now, we should know the outcome by the middle of next week. To put it into perspective, 15.5 million Iraqis were eligible to vote today, which is more than half of the population. However, the minority Sunnis were expected to either vote against the constitution or not vote at all.

Extra security for today's balloting including closing Iraq's borders, imposing overnight curfews, and placing about 100,000 Iraqi police and soldiers on duty. If the referendum passes, the constitution is then ratified and elections for a new, permanent government are held December 15th. The new government would then be sworn in in December, December 31st. But if it fail, the process starts over, the current parliament will be dissolved and another election for a new interim body will be held in mid-December. That group would then have to have until October to come up with a new draft constitution.

Let's get more on the vote from the Iraqi capital. CNN chief international correspondent Christiane Amanpour joins us from Baghdad. Christiane, good morning.

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, and Tony, if it sounds complicated the way you put that, it is, because it is very complex indeed. Although the Iraqi voters today were asked just to put a yes or no to whether they approved of the draft constitution, the implications are huge.

There's quite a lot of gunfire in the back, but I'm going to continue. There was, in fact, very little violence. A massive security crackdown by the U.S. forces, closed borders as you mentioned, huge blast walls at all of the polling stations -- that we have visited anyway -- to ward off suicide bombers and there was a steady trickle of voters into the polling stations.

There's so much gunfire behind and I'm trying to figure out what it is. But in any event, there was very little violence this morning and during the day of the voting, but for instance, in Fallujah which is the heartland of the Sunnis, according to the mayor there, half of the 45,000 or so registered voters turned out, but it appears according to the mayor that they turned out to cast a no vote.

This is because it is the Sunni heartland and many believe that the Sunnis in many parts of the country will vote no, but it is a difference, at least, because last January during the parliamentary elections, barely any Sunnis turned out at all.

Now, in Hilla, somewhat south of Baghdad, there was a turnout as well. People lined up to get into the ballots to cast their referendum vote. And all, of course, in Basra which is further south, the second largest effort province here in Iraq, heavily Shiite, there was an overwhelming turnout.

Some officials there believe that the turnout was even higher than it was in the January parliamentary elections, heeding the call from the Ayatollah Sistani to vote yes and to pass this constitution. Clearly, the majority Shiites and Kurds view this constitution as a huge gain for them. The Sunnis, on the other hand are extremely divided and don't know whether or not this is going to be any good for them or not. Many believe it will further fragment and split this country into further fragmentation and some even think that it may propel civil war. Aneesh Raman, CNN correspondent, is down at one of the polling stations which has just closed.

Aneesh, is counting starting there already?

ANEESH RAMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It's about to. We've been hearing the same gunfire you just heard, Christiane, as well. There's a lot of activity at the moment. The polls have just closed. The door behind me a short time ago was shot. It is unclear at the moment whether this is celebratory gunfire, something that we heard in January, that we hear around any number of events in Iraq, or whether there's something taking place outside.

While that's happening though, I'm just going to take you inside and talk a little bit about the vote. Some 50 percent was the turnout they're saying at this polling station. About 100,000 people were registered. About half of that actually showed up.

You were here during the January elections and by all accounts the lines were out the door. This time there was a very slow, but steady process that brought the voters in. As we've been mentioning all morning a complicated process that boils down really to one thing, is this political process going to go forward or is it going to start anew?

For a lot of Iraqis we spoke to here, those who voted yes, it was really less about the constitution and more about making sure that this process continues to go forward and those who voted no, a lot of them said they simply didn't have enough time to read the referendum, but in the midst of this gunfire we're hearing outside it is worth noting that within the capital city there have been few attacks.

The security was incredibly high leading up to this vote. The borders were closed, the provincial borders as well. And I'm just going start walking back as we talk about security. Limited attacks and they will clearly deem that, Christiane, as success, as I'm sure you saw as well.

AMANPOUR: Aneesh, indeed. And it probably is celebratory gunfire. We won't know for sure until a bit later, but it did start right on 5:00 as the polls were scheduled to close. Of course, the Iraqi security forces have taken the brunt, the forefront of the security which is a change from last time around.

We saw Iraqi police, Iraqi soldiers as I said blast walls around many of the polling stations to ward against and suicide car bombers and the American forces were in the so-called outer ring of security standing by just in case -- Tony.

HARRIS: Good work. Good reporting. Thank you both. Aneesh, if you are still there, we want to come back to you for just a second. And let me ask you this. We saw a lot of Iraqi soldiers seemingly running back and forth. We understand the notion that this might be celebratory gunfire, but it looked to me as though the soldiers who were running past you weren't altogether sure of that.

RAMAN: Well, clearly they're assuming nothing. They're going out there to secure the area, but Christiane points out that the polls just closed. It's 5:00 p.m. We often hear celebratory gunfire in Iraq. These doors at this polling station closed a short time ago.

They're assessing the situation now, but as she was mentioning, Iraqis as we've seen just now really taking the face, taking the front of this operation. Some of the police have been here for four days and now they're securing the area once again.

NGUYEN: Aneesh, we're going to ask you to stand by for just a moment. I we want to bring in our military analyst, Major General Don Shepperd to talk about this. I know that there's been the mention of celebratory gunfire. That's the first thing I said to you when I heard it. You said no. Tell me why.

MAJ. GEN. DON SHEPPERD, CNN MILITARY ANALYST: Well, I don't know for sure, but Aneesh and Christiane are certainly no strangers to gunfire there. There's always celebratory gunfire but anybody that's got a gun and descending (ph) a poll over there stands to be at great risk, and so they tried to keep weapons away from the polls. So I would doubt that it's celebratory gunfire just because the people would be taking a risk, but I don't know.

NGUYEN: Well, in looking at the Iraqi security forces that are around Aneesh, they had a seriousness about them.

SHEPPERD: Absolutely. And they're serious people for obvious reasons. I don't think they knew for sure what it was, but they're on edge, they're on alert, and the main thing that I heard was it was small arms fire, it was no RPGs, no grenades and no rockets or mortars which is the thing you kind of look for as well. So it wasn't serious gunfire or a big gun fight if indeed it wasn't celebratory.

NGUYEN: We see Aneesh now, he's put on his vest to protect himself, of course.

Aneesh, have you been told any information as to exactly where this gunfire is coming from and if indeed it's celebratory or if it's from insurgents?

RAMAN: Yes, no word yet. Clearly they're still out securing the perimeter. They're still essentially finding out themselves where exactly the gunfire is coming from. We put these on as a precaution, obviously. Even if it is celebratory gunfire, bullets go up, they have to come down. This is a precaution that we all take.

But we are seeing -- as we were just hearing the guest talk about, really the Iraqis are taking control of this situation. They know what to do. They're implementing plans that have been discussed for quite some time. And I was mentioning before, Dasaad (ph), a policeman who I was speaking to earlier, he's been at this polling station for four days.

They've been securing these election centers for quite some time to make sure no one infiltrates the election centers ahead of the vote and to make sure that on the day of, we don't see any dramatic attacks. We have not seen any yet.

Again, it is unclear, the gunfire you hear behind me, whether that's celebratory. But it's important to note, it really began right at 5:00, right when the polls closed so it would not be a surprise if, in fact, it was celebratory gunfire -- Betty.

HARRIS: And let's been Christiane Amanpour back in on this. And Christiane, there's a point you wanted to make?

AMANPOUR: Well, the thing is, we just don't know. And as Major General Shepperd said, it is very, very difficult to know, and it, frankly, is kind of strange to think that in these days of heavy clampdown security there would be this celebratory gunfire. We just don't know at the moment.

To be honest, we're getting conflicting reports from our own and other security personnel who are around here. Right now all we know is we've heard only small arms fire or a fairly sustained crackle of it. It seems to be calming down at the moment, but I think we're going to have to just wait and see what exactly this was.

HARRIS: OK.

NGUYEN: Well, and the general has a point to make as well -- General,

SHEPPERD: Yes, one of the things that we discussed with the people planning security over there where one of the things you want to watch for is the professionalism of the reaction of the police there. They did not run off towards the gun fire. One of the things that insurgent do is they will start a small firefight, draw the people away from what they're guarding and then attack their real target.

And I didn't see the people running out toward, running out toward the sound of the guns and what have you. They've maintained their position. They were alert. One guy was pointing up toward the roof, let's get up there high and see what's going on, take a bird's- eye view. So I saw good a discipline of the folks.

NGUYEN: General, you just got back from Iraq on Monday. Have you seen a great multitude of progress when it comes to these Iraqi security forces? And where are their numbers?

SHEPPERD: Yes, it's a little convoluted. First of all, the numbers are 200,000, made up of about 90,000 army and the rest police forces, 117 battalions, about 40 percent of these battalions in the fight.

Now what I saw was very encouraging from two points. One, we visited the 9th mechanized infantry division that was up at Taji. They're the best of the best and they are really ready and moving out on their own. They're taking over battle space and territory, if you will.

It varies between units over there, but what I heard from the people training them -- these are the American trainers embedded with these forces -- was very, very encouraging. They said these guys can do it. These guys are getting good and remember, they don't have to be as good as U.S. forces. They have to be better than insurgents. That's the key to us getting out of Iraq.

NGUYEN: Well, intelligence is also the key, too. How are they doing in that area? SHEPPERD: The thing about intelligence is, they know how to sort intelligence. They know who the bad guys are, what they look like, what the accents are -- all of the things that we are short on and don't know and struggle with all of the time. The quicker we can turn over intelligence and raids to these people, the better we are.

NGUYEN: All right. General Shepperd, we thank you for that.

I want to go now to Christiane who is in Iraq -- Christiane.

AMANPOUR: Well, I think you know, what this slight flurry of gunfire has shown us is the all-important question. Whatever this turns out to be, everybody who went to vote that we were able to talk to, including many of the security personnel who were standing by and of course, the American personnel too, key on their mind is whether this is going to break the back of the insurgency.

Most of the security personnel we talked to, most of the American forces say it's not going to, that this insurgency is very adaptable and it is very alive and it is, you know, just increasing its ferocity.

But what they do say is that without a political platform, without any political development, they won't have a chance of breaking this insurgency because no sooner do they wipe one cell out of a neighborhood it comes back within days because there's no political structure to take its place. So the political effort is equally as important as the military one.

Let's go down to Aneesh where there may be some more activity there.

RAMAN: Yes, Christiane, we are just getting a better sense, it seems at least from early indications as you suggested early on, this is in fact celebratory gunfire. It was the proximity of which that worried the forces who were here. It was so close at such a constant clip that a lot of them rushed out to secure the perimeter.

But as you were mentioning, that is why Iraq feels, at least those who have come to vote and have seen the security setup at this polling station, for example, they feel there is, perhaps, some hope. The insurgency incredibly adaptive. But, again, today we've seen the Iraqi security forces handle the situation at least for the moment -- Christiane.

AMANPOUR: Aneesh, OK. Let's turn to Nic Robertson in Baqubah, north of here where they are counting ballots as we wait to see what exactly this firefight exactly was. Nic, what is the situation where you are? They're counting. What was the turnout?

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Now, the ballots are being counted on the table here in this polling station. Now if we just pan the camera ...

(CROSSTALK)

AMANPOUR: Can you hear me in Baghdad? It's Christiane.

ROBERTSON: The piles for yes -- with this gentleman here, that is the pile for yes. Just across the table is the pile for no. The table is the pile for no and it appears, at least at this end of the table, the yes votes are outnumbering the no votes. And at the other end of the table, again it seems to be a similar sort of distribution.

We're looking there at a pile of yes votes and then the gentleman pan to the right, a pile of no votes, so on a rough, sort of guesstimate, it is (INAUDIBLE) gauging from the piles of papers in this room some 300 ballots cast in this room from about 1,600 ballots cast in the polling station as a whole, it does appear that there seem to be more yes ballots cast in this particular room. The actual counting, the official counting is just beginning now.

We just witnessed the sorting, and, Tony, quickly in minutes after the polls closed we just witnessed the sorting. Now the counting is beginning. We should be able to get the official count from this particular room and this particular polling station, one of 268 in Diyala Province, we should be able to get the results from this room fairly quickly. But at moment it looked like the yeses are edging just ahead here, Christiane.

AMANPOUR: And what about the turnout? Were you able to get any sort of impression or any sort of real facts on the turnout today?

ROBERTSON: In this particular polling station there were 2,800 registered voters. About 1,800 of them or about 1,600 of those turned out, just more than half. Now across the province as a whole, there were 7,600 registered voters, about 390,000 turned out. That was the count about half an hour before the polls closed.

That was just over 50 percent of all the registered voters and compared to the elections in January earlier this year, that is a significantly more people turned out in these elections now. About one-third of these electorate turned out in January, just over one- half turning out at the moment.

And we've talked to some of the Sunnis and it was the Sunnis who, by and large, were the ones who boycotted the polls back in January, but talked to Sunnis at this polling station did indeed not come out and vote in January, but did come out and vote in this particular election.

And though many of them told us that they were voting no, that they thought the referendum would divide the country and separated along sectarian lines, and they thought that as Sunnis, they would lose out. And as we're looking, the counting continues, very simple and quick counting here. One pile of yes votes, one pile of no votes and then in a few minutes I think, Christiane, we should get a pretty accurate idea of the counts in this room.

AMANPOUR: Nic, thanks. And you said that many of the Sunnis were concerned about the possibility of the country being divided by this constitution, in other words of splitting off, fragmenting and certainly that's what I heard from Sunnis in the Baghdad area as well. They are concerned that the autonomous self-rule arrangement that's been given to the Kurds and could be given to them and the Shiites in a future Iraq and could leave them out in the cold because the Shiites and the Kurds basically sit on all of Iraq's oil wells. So this is a big issue and we'll wait to see exactly how the Sunni vote goes.

As we know, if two-thirds of the population in any three provinces vote no, then the referendum will be defeated. Many people we've talked to are not sure exactly how it's going go, but the fact that there's been a higher than usual turnout in some Sunni areas is different than it was back in January. Now back to you, Tony and Betty.

HARRIS: Christiane, thank you. Thank you. Thanks to Aneesh, and thanks to Nic as well. Thank you all.

NGUYEN: And we also want to bring in again, Major General Don Shepperd. As we look at the close of yet another election, the second one there in Iraq, didn't see as much violence. Again, we don't know exactly what happened with the fire that we heard just moments earlier, but is that a result of the insurgent either growing weaker or the Iraqi security forces growing smarter and stronger?

SHEPPERD: I think probably the latter. The insurgency clearly is not growing weaker, but it's maintaining a certain level, but the Iraqi security forces, both the police and the military are getting clearly better and more capable. And this is their second election. They learned from the last one in which there was a few attacks.

They're backed up by U.S. forces out there if they really get in trouble with the rapid response forces. So good feather in the cap for the Iraqi forces. They're proud of themselves and that's very, very important. Each success builds confidence their own ability.

HARRIS: And -- oh, I'm sorry. Did you want to go?

NGUYEN: I was just going ask quickly, if this constitution does indeed pass what does that mean for U.S. troops? Will U.S. troops come home quicker?

SHEPPERD: Yes, what Americans want to know is if they pass this constitution, are they going to get home quicker or not? The answer is it probably has nothing to do with the constitution whether it passes or not. The key to Americans coming home is training the Iraqi forces and making them capable of taking over areas of cities and areas of the country, slowly getting them and turning the country back to them.

That's when we can come home, and the major thing is we must not set a date on that. We must make sure they're capable when we leave so they can sustain it.

HARRIS: Well, let's bring Christiane in on this particular point, and, Christiane, there are a lot of folks here stateside who are wondering -- and I know there are a lot of folks in Britain who are wondering the same thing, as to does this process today that we're seeing played out in Iraq, does this process move us any closer to troops and Britain and other coalition partners getting those back home?

AMANPOUR: Well, certainly, that's the hope amongst certainly the American government and the British government and the forces here on the ground. They hope against hope that they will be able to establish a political process that has a real sense of traction, a real sense that the people can buy into a government.

Remember, there's been interims and transitionals and all sorts of temporary governments and political formations for the last couple of years, and the population hasn't really been able to buy in to any kind of political permanence.

So they're hoping that with this constitution that might change somewhat, if it passes and if it doesn't cause the kind of -- fragmentation is the euphemism for civil war, if it doesn't cause the kind of break up that many Sunnis and many people looking in are concerned about.

When you talk to the U.S. military here, they say loud and clear that political development here is as important as the military strategy that's going on here, that they must get political leadership, local leadership and all of the pillars of a proper political system in place.

It takes a long time, they say, to create a sense of national identity. It's not going to happen overnight and that's the same with the military as well. The military here that's being set up, apart from being able to be proficient, must have a sense a -- according to analysts and other military experts, must have a sense that they're actually fighting and dying for a government that they believe in.

It's not just about numbers and capability. It's about what they're prepared to do for the government that eventually stands up here in Iraq. But if you're talking about the insurgency, I asked the commander of all U.S. forces yesterday and he said, look, this is not going end after this referendum. They're adapting their tactics and they're getting strong. The suicide car bombs are massively effective, causing mass casualties and the number of attacks against Iraqi civilians have steadily increased since last January's elections.

The situation in terms of the violence is very, very bad no matter which way you cut it, and General Casey said that an insurgency, basically if you look at the 20th century, lasts on average about nine years. So there's a long way to go before tampering down the violence.

HARRIS: OK. Christiane, stay with us please. We're going to take a quick break and come back with more of this conversation. This is CNN SATURDAY MORNING.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) NGUYEN: I want to take a live look now in Baqubah as the votes are being counted. The polling sites are closed, the vote is over. Now it's time to determine which way Iraqis voted on this new constitution. There have been over 6,000 polling sites open throughout the day.

That has closed within the past 26 minutes now and as these sites closed the counting will continue. Hopefully we'll have a number on exactly who voted which way within the next five days is what we're hearing.

HARRIS: Well, we're happy to have our chief international correspondent with us, Christiane Amanpour, in Baghdad and also Major General Don Shepperd with us here in Atlanta.

And, Christiane, you made a point that I want you to follow up on and General Shepperd, if you would as well. Christiane, you were just saying that there's this threshold that has to be crossed where the security forces in Iraq are not just taking a paycheck because it's one of the best paying jobs there, but they're also fighting for their country.

Is the sense there on the ground that that threshold has been met and crossed, that more and more of the Iraqi security forces are fighting for their country and not for the paycheck?

AMANPOUR: If you're asking me, no. According to the U.S. forces here who are leading the training and equipping and preparing of these Iraqi forces, that threshold has not yet been met. Why? Because there is no sense yet of full national identity because there isn't yet a fully permanent national government.

And not only that, a colonel who I was talking to today expressed a further and new worry that he is concerned -- and they're going to be watching quite closely for this -- that factualism and sectarianism is developing even within the armed forces.

In other words, the Shiites in some instances are conducting very questionable raids on Sunnis and others and gathering a whole bunch of people in some occasions which the U.S. then looks at the list of the people who have been gathered up and say they're not on our list, why were they gathered up?

And many U.S. officers are now having to go, they say, to some of the detention centers to make sure that these detentions by Shiites of Sunnis are legitimate and not just revenge. So there are all sort of issues that are quite troubling.

In addition, you know the whole controversy that was raised a couple of weeks ago when General George Casey went to Capitol Hill and faced a fairly angry Senate committee when he said that only one battalion of Iraqi forces was fully capable as opposed to three that they had announced earlier. He's basically saying that a lot goes into incorporating the meaning of fully capable. It's not just their capability. It's the vehicles and equipment they've got. It's the number of personnel on any given day, but the fact of the matter is that they are not yet fully capable of standing alone, but they are working hard to get them capable of leading fights with U.S. support. So they're working on all of these efforts to try to get these security forces up and going.

Let's just go to Nic Robertson now in Baqubah where they are counting. Nic, have they come in up with any firm numbers there?

ROBERTSON: We are get some numbers, Christiane. I think they're going to better give us a flavor of the way that the election has gone here rather than an exact set of results. But they've given us numbers from three of the different polling booth rooms from this particular polling station.

And the numbers add up like this: the yes votes, 227; the no votes 233. So you can see that it is looking very, very close and, of course, they're going to go through a recount. There are a couple of other polling booths and the polling stations to be added into that. But this area is a very mixed Sunni and Shia neighborhood. Perhaps the Shias slightly outnumber the Sunnis in this area.

The voting was up at this polling station, but I think this early indication does sort of reflect what we were hearing earlier in the day from people as they came to vote. The Shias pretty much say that they were voting yes because they thought that a constitution would give them a more secure and stable future.

And the Sunnis pretty much say that they would not vote for the constitution. They were voting against it because they thought that it was going to divide the country, that that would bring more conflict, more trouble and that they be disadvantaged by the constitution as it stood, Christiane.

AMANPOUR: Nic, I'm sorry, can you just repeat those numbers for yes and no so far?

ROBERTSON: Absolutely. What we have been told from three of the polling booth rooms in this polling station is that in those three, the results tally up this way, 227 yes, 233 no. So at the moment it appears and again, this is more of a sway than the exact numbers. I think that we can expect these numbers here to change, but at the moment it appears it's pretty much neck and neck, the nos slightly edging ahead, Christiane.

AMANPOUR: What did some of the Sunnis tell you when you asked them how they had cast their vote or if they wouldn't tell you that, what they thought of the constitution.

ROBERTSON: Well, the Sunnis that we talked to who were willing to discuss how they voted mostly told us that they voted no. They said that they had voted no because they thought that it would bring sectarian separation in the country, that they thought that they would be disenfranchised to a degree, that the Sunni community would come out worse, that the Shias were doing very well as the constitution and that's why they were voting no. I had to look pretty hard to try and find a Sunni who had voted yes in this referendum and I did find one man, an election observer here. He's a representative from the communist party and he said it is such a shame in the 21st century that we're discussing Sunni and Shia. He said this should not be an issue at all. He told me that he had voted yes in the referendum because although it was imperfect he said for Sunnis, he recognized that this was part of a process.

He recognized that the constitution can be opened up again, that there are elements of it that potentially can be changed when the new government is formed and it is expected to be formed early next year. So he was sort of looking further ahead although there were elements that he were dissatisfied with, Christiane.

AMANPOUR: Nic, thanks. You know, what that gentleman said to you, I heard also on the streets here in Baghdad. A Sunni who I spoke to who said he was voting no said that never before did we talk about Sunni-Shia, Kurd, for many, many years, despite our difficulties, despite the oppression under Saddam Hussein, Iraqis never really talked about their ethnic differences. They were Iraqis first and foremost. And many people are very concerned.

They say that it's only since the war that these differences have reared their very ugly heads and they're very concerned about that. And I think certainly from what I found on the streets going to about four different polling stations, mixed ones here in the Baghdad area, people are very, very concerned about the possibility that somehow in the future their country will lose its unity and will be fragmented. Aneesh is down at the polling station we've been talking to you. What are they saying now about how the votes are stacking up?

RAMAN: Christiane, an amazing sighting, incredibly simple, but enormously powerful. Right now behind me they are literally beginning to count the ballots, separating them into two piles, the yes pile further from me, the no pile closer to me. You're seeing a number of people in this room.

Each political party is allowed one representative at each of these sessions throughout the country as they count this ballot manually. The yes and the no vote, each of them verifies that you'll recall in January there were immediate suggestions after that vote of voter fraud. They are trying to counter that today.

Over here, too and you'll notice by the way that there's a lamp on the desk and the lighting of the room essentially comes from our camera light. The power is out. Again, in need of Iraqis, basic needs that they're hoping perhaps a permanent government beyond the stability you're talking about can bring. They will then start writing on this chalkboard, yes, no. They can't tell, it's something gets disregarded if there's a fault with the ballot.

Once these numbers are tallied, all the representatives will look at it, verify it. They will then take those numbers and head it over to the election officials in Baghdad. About 500,000 -- sorry, 50,000 people turned out here. The registered number was about 100,000, so 50 percent turnout. You were at this polling station back in January. The lines were well outside, people waiting to vote. We saw periods of virtual emptiness here today, but nonetheless, an incredibly powerful image as the ballots get counted here tonight, Christiane.

AMANPOUR: That's exactly right. I didn't see the kind of lines today that I did see back in even in Baghdad, certainly in other parts of the country in January. Today, though, of course in the Shiite heartland in Basra, there were huge lines. People turned out overwhelmingly. Some even suggest that in the Shiite heartland, they turned out in higher numbers than they did back in January.

Many believe that they are responding to that last-minute call from their spiritual leader the Ayatollah Ali Sistani who's called on all Shiites to turn out and vote yes for the constitution, the constitution seen as a big victory for the Shiites and for the Kurds who were very much oppressed, certainly in the last years of the Saddam Hussein rule.

Now, this referendum will pass if a simple - if a majority of the people of this country vote for it, but it will fail if two-thirds of the voters in just three provinces vote against it and that is why people are looking very closely at the results in the Diyala province, in the al Anbar province which has Fallujah and Ramadi, in the Ninjiva (ph) province which has Mosul as its capital and the Salahdean province (ph) which has Tikrit as its capital which is the former homeland or the hometown of Saddam Hussein.

We've heard from our people who are in Fallujah that according to the mayor there, about half the registered voters turned out in Fallujah, half of the 45,000 registered voters turned out, but we're told that most of those voted no. That's according to the mayor who told our people there in Fallujah and in Ramadi, the other main part of the al Anbar province, there was almost nobody out, people too afraid of the insurgents. It looked like a ghost town. We'll be back after a break.

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NGUYEN: Taking a live look now in Baghdad as the votes are being counted. Many people have their eyes on the numbers there and on the ballots as they are there to make sure everything is counted correctly. The polls are all closed and now it's time to find out who voted which way.

We want to go now to chief international correspondent, Christiane Amanpour, in Baghdad. And Christiane, I want to ask you because in the first election back in January, there was a lot of excitement, a lot of Iraqis behind that and they came out in full force. Did you feel the same kind of excitement -- you're there on the ground -- this time around? Do Iraqis really understand what they're voting for?

AMANPOUR: Well, last time around there was a turnout of about 60 percent and people were very excited because they came out braving all the insurgent threats. There was a really vicious campaign against the people and yet they braved those threats and came out and voted. And there was a great sense of elation and exhilaration, not just here in Iraq, but around the world, people looking in and seeing this one successful day.

Very tragically that exhilaration petered out after a few weeks because the insurgency mounted again and got even worse and as I say attacks have increased. The sophistication of their -- in terms of their huge car bombs have increased. They were able to kill masses of people at one time and so the number of deaths and targeting in -- by the insurgents has increased. So that has really upset a lot of people here and has really spun this country into a very, very dangerous state of sectarian violence.

So that when people have come now to vote for this referendum, the sense of excitement is less, but the sense that it's important among many, many people is very intense because people hope against hope that any one of these milestones, if you like is going to help them have a better life and a better future. The people who we asked today all said that they're voting for peace. They're voting for a better future and a better life, that they're really fed up with this violence and that it is really beginning to shake their confidence.

So people are really, really hopeful that there will be a meaningful change after today, but I don't think they should wait for immediate change according to U.S. officials that we've been talking to. It will take some time. Aneesh is down at one of the polling stations that he's been manning all day, where they are now counting in semidarkness because, of course, there's no electricity there. They've got some kind of battery-operated lamps, Aneesh. What are they saying about what the count is?

RAMAN: Well, right now as you're imagining, it's incredibly muggy. The power is out as is often the case in Baghdad, two sort of electric, kerosene like lamps. They have polled into groups of 25, the ballots and they've put them in groups of yes or no.

The 25 is simply to count and what they are doing right now is individually opening each one and on the blackboard behind me, you can see these columns. The one furthest to the right, it's a accumulative number, next to that is yes, followed by no, followed by inconclusive, followed by something wrong with the ballot. So they are going to go through methodically each ballot at this polling station.

There are any number of observers. I'm going to just have my cameraman pan wide. You can see a number of people huddled around this table. A number of them are international observers mixed in with observers from political parties. You'll recall Christiane in January, there was a lot of calls of voter fraud immediately after the election. They are very keen to prevent that now. At this polling station you were talking about turnout.

About 100,000 Iraqis were registered to vote at this polling station. Half of them showed up and that's similar to what we saw at other polling stations in Baghdad. Perhaps it is a sense of fatigue among the voters, a symbolic value of January's vote not there now. An enormously complex situation that in the end Christiane boils down to an incredibly simple process. They will manually now open each of these groups of 25 and individually count how many yes, how many no, Christiane? AMANPOUR: Well, Aneesh, I have a slight advantage. I can see over your shoulder and read the blackboard and it looks there like the yes vote is higher than the no vote which is good for the referendum. Certainly, many people said that they hadn't had a chance to really get to know exactly what the referendum was.

Many people hadn't read the booklet that was handed out and then of course you have these last minute changes and amendments that weren't even included in the booklet because they came after the booklet on the constitution was distributed. What are people telling you about what they know about the precise details of the constitution?

RAMAN: Well, you're exactly right. Draft documents of the constitution didn't go out to Iraqis really until last week and those were incomplete because amendments were made during that Shia-Kurd deal with the Sunni Islamic, Iraqi Islamic party. For the people though, they have watched this closely. That's been followed in the Iraq press and I'll have my cameraman pan up so you can see the ballot counting talk while we talk. They know the big issues. They know federalism is the huge monster issue, how powerful will regional governments be.

They also know that the rights of women are up for debate. Women's groups have been very vocal in the negotiating process. They are aware that Islam will be a main source and it remains to be seen what the implications will be. But it's important to note that a lot of them were voting for the political process. Those who voted yes wanted to see a permanent government in place, Christiane, by mid- December.

A five-year government they think is perhaps the best hope in getting rooms (ph) like this and times like this, electricity and they know that if it is rejected, another transitional period will ensue, but really public awareness was not well. Some polls said 50 percent unaware of what they were voting on.

AMANPOUR: Aneesh, you just said something really important about the political process. It is really incredible to see all these people. Millions of people in the Arab world going to a free vote and that is having an impact on people in neighboring countries. I was in Syria not long ago and ordinary people there said that despite the chaos, despite the violence, despite the fact that they oppose the war in Iraq, it was quite something to see people cast a free vote.

That was shortly after the elections in January, they told me that and people wished that they would have that chance themselves as well. Octavia Nasr who monitors the Arab world for us is in CNN (ph). What are you seeing and hearing in terms of reaction to today's referendum around the Arab world?

OCTAVIA NASR, CNN CORRESPONDENT: No doubt, Christiane, Arab media in general see this as a big day, as a major day, not only for Iraq, but for the entire region. You know, the star station that we've been monitoring today is Al-Irahiya (ph), the local Iraqi TV station. The station that used to spread the propaganda for Saddam Hussein and his video clips and music and songs hailing him and his achievements.

Today that station took on a very different role. They had remote locations all over the country. They sent in live reports from polling stations and they reported on the story up until only a few minutes ago because as you know, the Id-al-Fitr hour is approaching in Iraq and people are getting ready to break their fast. This is the holy month of Ramadan.

So now that station took a break but you'll have to see the way they covered the story. It was very interesting because there was no question as to on which side of the referendum, Al-Irahiya was. They were certainly for a yes vote. They showed lines of people, especially women, standing in line there waiting to vote. They talked to people who said yes, yes, yes, repeatedly and at the end of their coverage, it was very interesting how they all celebrated the end of the day and they congratulated each other.

They called each other heroes. They admitted the fact that they all braved out the threats and the violence that was lurking all over Iraq and went out and the way people went out and voted. Before I continue, I'd like to go back to Baghdad and Aneesh Raman who is standing by at a voting station and he might have some news for us. Aneesh?

RAMAN: Well, this is clearly a stronghold, this one polling center in the main city, not nearly representative of the country, but right now to update you about 170 ballots were cast in favor of the constitution, about 60 against. But I also wanted to make light of the ballots that you're seeing there, not the ones wrapped in these groups of 25 we were telling you about.

Those were essentially absentee ballots of members of Iraqi security forces, who were here helping to protect this polling station who were voting out of province. An absentee ballot for those who protected this place for the past four days to prevent any infiltration of explosives.

We're seeing them now take the groups of 25 ballots into this bag and it will then be read out and broadcast on the board. But again, about two to one, we're seeing voting in favor of the constitution at the moment at this polling station, 170 votes yes, about 60 votes no. And we're going to be back right after this break for more coverage of this pivotal day in the new Iraq.

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NGUYEN: Taking you now back to Baghdad where you can see ballots are still being counted as Iraqis went to the polls today, some 15.5 million registered to vote. We'll see how many turned out today to place their ballot on which way they feel the constitution should go.

Should it be a yes or should it be a no? That was the simple question on the ballot today. A yes or no answer and those ballots are being counted as we speak. Polling sites closed about 52 minutes in Iraq. We've been speaking with chief international correspondent in Baghdad, Christiane Amanpour. She will be with us in the next hour as well. We appreciate that insight.

HARRIS: If ratified, the new constitution would directly impact the lives of all Iraqis, women perhaps most of all. Zainab Salbi is president and CEO of Women for Women International and she joins us now from Washington with her insights on the proposed constitution. Good to talk to you and good morning.

ZAINAB SALBI, WOMEN FOR WOMEN INTL: Good morning to you.

HARRIS: Well, you've watched this process unfold. We're all sort of from the outside looking in on the process. What do you think of it? What do you make of it?

SALBI: Well, the process is a questionable issue. There are a lot of women as members of the civil society do feel there wasn't a process or a thorough process of discussion. They do feel marginalized in the discussion of it. We, through Women International we have several conferences where we brought women and the constitution draft and committee members and a lot of people were worried about the process.

Having said that, women did definitely gain some rights in this draft constitution. An example of that is citizenship laws. For the first time in Iraqi women history, they can pass on their citizenship to their children even if they are not married to Iraqi men. This is actually revolutionary in many Arab countries.

Other laws that they have other gains is in the quota system. Now they have a guarantee of 25 percent representation in the Iraqi parliament. On the other hand, laws such that regulate family law, particularly as it relates to inheritance, custody, marriage, divorce are vague, leaving women very vulnerable to more restrictive interpretations of their rights, their mobility and their access to resources.

Now, this in an atmosphere of violence against women where educated women are targeted for assassination, where female college students are being targeted for kidnapping and raids and for hair salons are being bombed. A lot of women are worried about the future.

HARRIS: On ballots, is it clear whether or not we have a constitution that is more reflective of Islamic law or secular law or are we somewhere in the middle here?

SALBI: Well, the current constitution or the proposed constitution said that Islam is a source of interpretation of the laws. Neither religious or secular laws are inherently good or bad for women. It is about how you interpret the law. Now the way it is drafted right now it is introducing religious courts to regulate family matters such as marriage, divorce, inheritance and custody.

It does introduce religious scholars to interpret the laws in the supreme court and all of these things leave women, you know, vulnerable to who is going interpret the law. Is it going to be conservative, religious scholars who will restrict women's rights or is it going to be scholars who will give women's rights? Now I believe that we really cannot build strong countries if we do not have strong women and women's rights are not only about women's rights. It is about the direction of the country. Women are like a bellwether for how the society goes.

HARRIS: So as we're watching the vote count continue there in Baghdad, I have to ask you what do we have here? Do we have something that I guess by all accounts is not perfect. Is it even good?

SALBI: Let me tell you, we had a meeting with a lot of Iraqis between parliamentarians and the women in a civil society and while a lot of them have complained about the process and had concerns about the proposed constitution, many said that they will vote because they did believe that this is an important process and that this is a crucial point in stabilizing the country. So I can tell you that a lot of people were adamant that they will vote for the constitution.

HARRIS: I'm curious, you grew up there, you were born there, correct?

SALBI: Yes, I did, I lived most of my life there.

HARRIS: What kind of a day is this in your estimation, moving forward, obviously, but how significant?

SALBI: It's as important -- the process I'm much more attached to the process than the outcome. I would think that this constitution or, you know, an amended constitution is a very important stepping stone in Iraqis' history. We need to have ownership of it. There needs to be more discussion of it, nature of the country, of the direction of the country and this is still to be done. There still needs to be more work on that.

HARRIS: Zainab Salbi is the president and CEO of Women for Women International. Thanks for taking the time to talk us.

SALBI: A pleasure, thank you.

NGUYEN: Well as we mentioned, the polls are closed in Iraq. The counting continues and that will continue for a little while. Today Iraqis voted on a new constitution. Coming up at the top of the hour we will take you back live to Baghdad to see whether the Iraqi people turned out in full force for this vote. History unfolding live right here on CNN. We'll be right back.

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