KIRKUK, Iraq, May 25 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) - The election of a local council in the oil-rich northern province of Kirkuk ended Sunday, May 25, when the commander of U.S. occupation forces in the region swore in six members whose selection had been contested by Arabs on grounds that they were mostly Kurds.

"After consultations, I did not find any procedural error. I therefore call on the six delegates to be sworn in," U.S. 4th Infantry Division Major General Raymond Odierno, commander of U.S. occupation forces in northeast Iraq, told some 40 of the 300 delegates who had elected 24 members of the 30-seat council on Saturday, May 24.

But the election in the multi-ethnic town, which includes Kurds, Arabs, Turkmen and Assyrian Christians, was overshadowed by complaints that Kurds made up most of the six "independent" candidates appointed by the U.S. occupation forces in addition to the 24, the BBC News Online reported.

Abderrahman al-Assi, an Arab delegate who had led the protest on Saturday, accepted Odierno's decision, which he had deferred for a day.

"We objected, but our objection was not taken into consideration. We can't do more than that," Assi told Agence France-Presse (AFP).

Kurdish, Arab, Turkmen and Assyrian Christian groups, made up of 39 members each, had elected six of their own community to the council.

Then, another 144 "independents" among the 300 delegates drew up a list of 12 independent nominees, from which Odierno had selected six to complete the membership of the council. Those six, including four Kurds, one Turkman and one Assyrian, sparked howls of protest from the Arab community.

The town has long been seen as a potential powder keg as a result of Saddam Hussein's efforts to alter its ethnic balance by forcing Kurds from their homes and allowing Arabs to move in. Ten people were killed in clashes last week sparked by the fact that Arabs now claim to be the majority in a traditionally Kurdish town.

Odierno, who made the selection, said he would take the protests into account.

"I will conduct a personal review of the independents' representations and tomorrow I'll make a decision," he was quoted by the BBC News Online as saying.

Many Iraqis voiced fears that the U.S. forces did not want to bring stability to the war-dashed country, but rather to maintain a grip of the country’s oil reserves, the second largest in the world after Saudi Arabia’s.

They cited the chaos, anarchy and lawlessness which Iraqis said the U.S. forces did little to end them and rushed to protect the Oil Ministry headquarters while turning a blind eye to looting of all other government institutions, including universities and national museums containing irreplaceable artefacts.

In the southern port of Basra, British forces announced they would replace an Iraqi city council hailed as a model of post-war cooperation with a committee of technocrats chaired by a British military commander.

The decision sparked an angry reaction from the 30-member council, which is headed by a local tribal chief and has laboured to re-establish civic order in the southern metropolis.

Also Sunday, Ayatollah Mohammed Baqer al-Hakim, a leading Shiite cleric who returned from exile earlier this month, lashed out at the U.S. presence in Iraq as he visited the holy city of Karbala for the first time since leaving the country 23 years ago.

"Why is the running of the country and the government not transferred to Iraqis? Are they still minors who cannot govern their country?" he asked at the Imam Hussain domed mosque, the holiest shrine of the 12 Shiite imams.

Meanwhile, the U.S. occupation forces said Sunday they had captured a “suspected ringleader” behind attacks on their soldiers in the flashpoint Iraqi city of Fallujah, and nabbed 17 others.

They said the suspect in the city was arrested in a raid early Saturday, May 24, and that 17 others had been detained, all of them believed to have taken part in attacks on the U.S. occupation soldiers.

The statement did not make reference to specific attacks in Fallujah, west of Baghdad, where U.S. forces said Thursday, May 23, they had shot dead two people allegedly took part in an overnight ambush. It also did not say where the others were captured.

Tension has been high in the Sunni Muslim stronghold city, where at least 16 anti-U.S. protesters were shot dead there by U.S. troops in April.

Sheikh Jamal al-Shakir, a prayer leader who had appealed for calm after the April shootings, lashed out at the Americans during his weekly Friday sermon and blamed them for the lack of security in the city.