Security measures in place for pending Iraqi election as attacks mount News
Security measures in place for pending Iraqi election as attacks mount

[JURIST] Extra security measures [JURIST report] running through Sunday's election came into force in Iraq Friday [Iraqi Security Minister briefing] on a day when attacks on voting stations around Iraq resulted in 11 deaths. Driving of automobiles is now banned between 7 pm and 6 am, and all pedestrians are being kept away from polling centers. Saturday will see the closing of the Baghdad airport as well as the six borders Iraq shares with neighboring countries. Extra US soldiers have been deployed to reinforce the Iraqi-Syrian border in an attempt to discourage entrance of would-be troublemakers. On election day itself polling centers will be heavily guarded on election day by an outer ring of nearly 100,000 Iraqi police and an inner ring consisting of US and Iraqi military forces. Iraq's military chief of staff, General Babakir Zebari, has said that he would have preferred a delay in the election, but has expressed confidence in his soldiers' election day performance. Aljazeera has more.

THIS DAY @ LAW

No lynchings reported in US for first time

On December 30, 1952, the Tuskegee Institute reported that 1952 was the first year of no lynchings of African Americans in the United States in the 71 years it had kept records. Learn more about lynching and listen to Billie Holiday's jazz recording of the 1938 protest song Strange Fruit.

USSR established

On December 30, 1922, representatives of Russia, Belarus, Ukraine and the Transcaucus approved the Treaty on the Creation of the USSR and the Declaration of the Creation of the USSR, creating the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR). During World War II, the USSR would also annex Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia and Moldova. Learn more about the history of the USSR from the BBC.