Baghdad - A selection of key provinces in the Iraqi provincial council elections, due to take place on January 31.

Baghdad The capital of Iraq and a city of some 6.5 million people, Baghdad has been the focus of the five-year war, and scene of some of the worst sectarian atrocities. Its demographic make-up has shifted as a result. Ongoing security worries threaten to tarnish the vote. The key contest will be between candidates aligned with Sunni tribal councils, and the Iraqi Islamic Party, which is currently in government, especially in the city's western suburbs.

Baghdad  - In 1980, while Mouein al-Qatimy was still a student in Baghdad, Saddam Hussein executed his two brothers. They had refused to join the former dictator's Iraqi Baath Party.

Mouein was told that he was next.

"From that day the security forces started to follow me. They told me 'your destiny will be like them' if you don't conform," he told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa.

"The old regime did not give any room for opposition in Iraq," he said.

Mouein fled Iraq and lived in exile for more than 20 years.

Baghdad - In the final days of Iraq's provincial elections campaign, women's rights advocates across the country are pressing the government to make last-minute amendments on the current provisional elections law to guarantee women a greater share of seats on the councils than in previous polls.

They are working to guarantee that women will break the previous ceiling of 25 per cent of seats.

Mosul  - Fifty three-year-old Umm Farah, a mother of three, had no choice but to flee from Mosul to Baghdad on a wintry night. Like many others, she says, she was subject to death threats simply because she is a Christian.

As the country heads into an election period widely hoped to deliver stability and greater democratic representation, Iraq's Christian community is barely emerging from a wave of sectarian murder and intimidation.

Despite a reduction in violence in previously incendiary provinces such as Anbar, Mosul had become a locus of al-Qaeda militant activity by late 2008.

"Although Iraq's security had improved, we are still living through brutal days. We have lost our safety and security forever," said Umm Farah.

Baghdad  - Throughout Iraq's provincial election campaign, the campaign posters of secular candidates can be seen across the country side by side with those of the well-financed religious powers.

This cohabitation is a new phenomenon, and highlights the subtle but increasingly important struggle between the more established religious parties and newer secular forces.

Religious groups are participating in these elections with greater financial resources and regional support, with much of it believed to be coming from Iran.

On the other side, secular parties are banking on popular disenchantment with the performance of the clerical coalitions, who dominated the last provincial vote in 2005.

Cairo  - Iraq's provincial elections, due to take place on January 31, may be a vote for new representatives in 14 of the country's 18 provinces, but - as with so much in Iraq - they are not just a local affair.

The effect of Iraq's neighbouring states on the outcome of the elections remains a factor that cannot be ignored, as all neighbours play out their cards using their individual connections to Iraqi domestic politics.

Revolutionary Shiite Iran continues to be perceived as the key external player in Iraq, where Shiites make up the majority of the population.