Iraq began compiling election results from around the country on Tuesday and eased security measures surrounding its historic poll despite al Qaeda's vow to pursue "holy war" after failing to deter millions from voting. Vote totals were being checked, then added up by computer after first tallies were completed by hand at polling stations nation-wide and truckloads of ballots from Sunday's election were shipped under guard to Baghdad's fortified Green Zone.
The final results, expected to be released early next week, are certain to put Iraq's Shia majority in power for the first time, marking a sea change in the nation's politics after eight decades of rule by minority Sunni Muslim Arabs.
Although Iraqis braved insurgent threats and streamed to the polls in many places, turnout was low in the Sunni heartland where the guerrillas are strongest - highlighting the dangerous sectarian rifts facing a new government.
Leaders of the US-backed interim government said it was too early to ask American-led forces to leave, though Iraq's president said some of the 170,000 foreign troops in the country could withdraw by the end of the year. Prime Minister Iyad Allawi has urged rival ethnic and religious groups to unite after the country's first multi-party vote in nearly half a century.
But al Qaeda's wing in Iraq, whose leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi had threatened "infidel" voters with death in a bid to torpedo the election, said on Monday it would pursue its war against US-led occupying forces and Iraqis working with them.
"We in the al Qaeda Organisation for Holy War in Iraq will continue the jihad until the banner of Islam flutters over Iraq," said a statement posted on an Islamist Web site.
Despite the warning, authorities reopened Iraq's borders and flights resumed at Baghdad international airport.
The closures had been part of a security blitz, including an election day ban on civilian traffic and extended night-time curfews, credited with preventing insurgents from making good on their threat to turn the poll into a bloodbath.
The insurgents' failure to do that has raised the prospect of Iraq's new government assuming greater responsibility for security, paving the way for withdrawal of the foreign troops.
Echoing comments by other Iraqi leaders, Interim President Ghazi al-Yawar told reporters: "By the end of this year, we will witness the beginning of reducing the number of these foreign forces."
But he insisted any drawdown would depend on how fast Iraq's security services could be built up.
US troops kill four in Iraq prison riot
US troops opened fire to quell a riot at a military run prison in southern Iraq, killing four inmates and wounding six, US military authorities said Tuesday.
The disturbances erupted Monday during a routine search of part of the inmate area at Camp Bucca prison near the border with Kuwait, a statement said.
An investigation into the riot was under way but Lieutenant Colonel Barry Johnson, a spokesman for US military prison operations, said there was "no direct" link to the country's election on Sunday.
All of the dead and injured were Iraqi, Johnson told AFP. "Some third country nationals are held at Camp Bucca but they were not involved in the disturbances."
The troubles lasted about 45 minutes before US troops opened fire, according to the military.
"The violence erupted after a routine search for contraband in one of the camp's 10 compounds," said the statement.