ERBIL, Kurdistan Region of Iraq - The head of the Kurdistan Region’s elections team at Iraq’s Independent High Electoral Commission (IHEC) on Sunday said 98 percent of preparations for the upcoming federal parliamentary elections have been completed in the Region.

“98 percent of the preparations have been completed, all equipment and ballot papers have arrived, and inspection of the equipment has been conducted,” Nabard Omar said during a presser.

“For this election, there will be no fingerprint issue, as that problem has been resolved by installing a device that reads Face ID,” he added.

Issues with digital fingerprint registration were a common theme in previous elections, especially among older voters and those with corroded fingertips as a result of cleaning who had lost the grooves in their fingertips, requiring multiple attempts to get a reading or completely failing to get one in certain cases.

Omar said all equipment will be taken to the schools that are set to become polling centers on November 6 and clarified that there will be no curfew or travel ban between cities and in airports.

There is no room for fraud, according to Omar, who explained that at 6 pm on election, the ballot boxes will electronically provide the results. All votes will be manually recounted in the presence of impartial observers afterward, he added.

The IHEC official also noted that international diplomatic missions will play a role in securing the integrity of the vote.

“We clarified the guidelines and election procedures to consulates and diplomatic missions and requested them to become observers of the election process. So far, ten consulates and international organizations have registered as observers, and we expect others to register in the coming days,” Omar said.

According to the Kurdistan Region’s election committee, out of 388,000 voter cards, 41,000 remain to be collected. Anyone without a voting card will not be able to cast a ballot. 

The electoral silence period is slated for November 8 at 7 am; electoral campaigns must be immediately and completely halted afterwards.

Special voting is scheduled to take place a day after the silence period, where special forces and members of security services will cast their votes.