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Clashes fuels suspicion aheed of Syria vote

AFP, Damascus
Syria's authorities and the opposition yesterday traded accusations over who was behind blasts that rocked Damascus and Aleppo, on the eve of parliamentary polls designed to boost the regime's legitimacy.
Overnight violence in Damascus province killed three people, a rights watchdog said, as the authorities made final preparations for a vote it says is crucial for building "the new Syria" but which the opposition has already dismissed as a" farce."
Information Minister Adnan Mahmud said that voting today was an act of defiance.
"By taking part in the election, Syrians are defying the campaign of terrorism and aggression led by international and regional parties implicated in a terrorist war against our country," he said.
The opposition for its part blamed the regime for two bomb blasts
Saturday in Damascus and one in Aleppo, where according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights an explosion hit a car wash as a bus was passing by, killing at least five people.
State media, which reported three deaths from the Aleppo blast, including a 10-year-old boy, blamed "terrorists" linked to the opposition for carrying out Saturday's attacks in a bid to sow instability ahead of the vote.
But in spite of a UN backed ceasefire, army attacks on rebel positions continued elsewhere in Syria, with several people wounded and a number of houses destroyed when the Arida village in central Homs province was shelled, the Observatory said.
Today's vote, against a backdrop of unrest which the Observatory says has killed more than 11,000 people since March last year, will do little to change the autocratic country, according to regime critics and analysts.
The vote, initially scheduled for
September 2011, was postponed to May 7 this year after Assad announced the launch of a reform process.
Bashar al-Haraki, a member of the Syrian National Council, the principal opposition coalition, has labelled the elections a "farce which can be added to the regime's masquerade."
Washington has described them as "ridiculous."
Security and logistical concerns notwithstanding, the credibility of the vote has also been hit by the refusal of the main opposition forces to participate.
The election will be the first time Syria has held multi-party elections since the adoption in February by referendum of a new constitution that ended the five-decade stranglehold on power of the ruling Baath party.
A total of 7,195 candidates have registered to stand for the 250 seats.
But experts believe litde will change politically in Syria, where a tenuous UN-backed ceasefire has failed to take hold.