You can't keep freedom down.
Iraqi expatriates began casting ballots in Sydney on Friday, several jostling to be among the first to vote in Iraq's first independent elections in more than 50 years.
"This is a long dream that now comes true," said 56-year-old Karim Jari before casting his vote. "We hope this is a new beginning."
Australia is one of 14 nations where Iraqis living outside their country can vote and the first country in the world to begin collecting ballots because of its time zone. In Iraq, the vote is Sunday; elsewhere, it runs Friday through Sunday.
About two dozen people jostled to be among the first to vote at 7 a.m. Friday in Australia.
Rebwar Aziz, who was lived in Australia since 1992, got the honor.
"This is freedom for Iraqi people," the 38-year-old bus driver said.
He rejected the wave of attacks by insurgents in Iraq aimed at disrupting the vote there.
"The point is if you need freedom, you have to fight for it," he said. "I feel great. I can't express my happiness."
Many historians consider the last free elections in Iraq to have taken place in 1954, when opposition won seats in an election held under British colonial influence. Iraq was a constitutional monarchy at the time.
As voting got under way in Sydney, a group of about a dozen protesters of the Communist Party of Iraq began shouting in Arabic and waving banners with Arabic and English slogans including: "No to American terrorism. No to Islamic terrorism."
But they quickly were drowned out by a larger contingent who cheered, chanted, clapped and danced outside the polling station.


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