Elections commission slams \'reprehensible accusations\'

The Central Elections Commission denounced a Hamas leader's "reprehensible accusations" on Wednesday, denying Mahmoud Zahhar's claims that it was involved in voter fraud. "It’s a reprehensible accusation. This commission, with all its members, ran the previous parliamentary and presidential elections. All factions, in addition to the international community, applauded its work," the commission said. In a rare rebuke from the independent body, the commission issued a statement saying it felt compelled to respond to remarks by Zahhar to an Algerian newspaper earlier this week. He had accused the commission of excluding Hamas members from registering in the West Bank and other actions which he said cast doubt on its ability to function independently. Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri meanwhile said the reason his party suspended preparations in the Gaza Strip, effectively calling a halt to reconciliation with their Fatah rivals, was as a direct response to political repression in the West Bank. Addressing a rally against political arrests by students in Gaza City, Abu Zuhri said recent events in Hebron University were the last straw in a string of events persuading Hamas to call off election groundwork. Around 10 students are holding a sit-in in the southern West Bank university, and several of them have been on hunger strike for a week, a Ma'an correspondent said. They are protesting the detention of Hamas members by the Fatah-led Palestinian Authority. Abu Zuhri said Hamas insists elections be carried out in a fair environment, and the PA's detentions led them to halt the work of the Central Election Commission in updating Gaza's voter register last week, a day before the process was due to launch. The commission was set to open registration centers across Gaza between July 3 and 14, the first such initiative to update the registers since the last local elections were held in January 2005. Electoral registration was slated as the first step to implementing the long-stalled reconciliation deal between the factions signed in May 2011, ushering in promised elections to reunite Gaza and the West Bank. Fatah officials accused Hamas of backing out of the deal. The head of the reconciliation committee within Fatah said Wednesday the unity deal with Hamas was "frozen" since Hamas stopped the work of the elections commission. Azzam Ahmad told Ma'an that no further meetings or talks would be held until the committee is able to resume its work. “Because the elections commission is independent, neither Hamas nor Fatah nor anyone has a right to intervene in its work," Ahmad said, speaking from Cairo.