If security allows, the United Nations will send a team to Iraq to assess whether elections can be held by the end of June, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan said Tuesday.

During a visit to Paris, Annan said if the coalition's provisional authority could guarantee security, he would dispatch a team of experts to assess the feasibility of holding elections for Iraq's transitional legislative assembly before July.

Annan's decision followed requests made by the Iraqi Governing Council and the US-led occupation coalition earlier this month.

Security has been one of the United Nations' top concerns for its staff working in the violence-ravaged country.

Annan ordered the pullout of all UN international staff from Iraq in October after the UN headquarters in Baghdad sustained two bombing attacks, in one of which more than 20 people were killed, including former UN special representative Sergio de Mello.

Under a deal reached between the coalition and the Governing Council in November, a transitional legislature, picked through caucuses in Iraq's 18 provinces, would select a provisional government in June. The deal was opposed by Shiites, who make up two-thirds of Iraq's population and instead favor direct elections.

(Xinhua News Agency January 28, 2004)