BAGHDAD, Iraq - Preparations for the Jan. 30 national election are on track despite continuing violence and calls for delaying or boycotting the vote, the U.N. election chief in Iraq says.

"I won't say I am happy, but I am satisfied with the process," Carlos Valenzuela said. "People tend to have these very unrealistic expectations about elections. ... They are not a panacea, but they seem to me at least at this moment the one way to go that would help the process" in Iraq.

Valenzuela heads a team of 20 U.N. staff in Iraq and 15 more in neighboring Jordan who are giving technical assistance to the Independent Electoral Commission of Iraq, which was set up earlier this year with the help of the United Nations.

The Jan. 30 vote is for a 275-member assembly that will appoint a government and draft a permanent constitution. The constitution would then form the legal basis for another general election.

Leading Sunni Arab clerics have called for a boycott of the vote to protest both the recent U.S. military offensive against the Sunni insurgent stronghold of Fallujah and the continued presence of American forces in Iraq.