Saleh al-Mutlaq, a prominent Iraqi politician banned from contesting next month's parliamentary elections, has announced he is withdrawing his party from the March 7 vote.
The opposition National Dialogue Front's decision comes after al-Mutlaq, a Sunni Arab MP, was barred from participating in the elections for alleged ties to the Baath party of Saddam Hussein, Iraq's ousted leader.
"The National Dialogue Front has made its final stand. It will boycott the election, but it will stay part of the political process," Haider al-Mulla, a party spokesman, said in a statement.
"The call is open for other political parties to take the same stand as our front. The whole issue is not related to [the candidate ban], rather the unsuitable atmosphere of this election."
Al-Mutlaq is one among 145 candidates barred from contesting the upcoming elections by a de-Baathification committee. The ban has subsequently been upheld by the Iraqi supreme court of appeal.
Cross-sectarian coalition
Al-Mutlaq's party was part of Iraqiya, a cross-sectarian coalition headed by former prime minister Iyad Allawi, a secular Shia with ambitions to become prime minister again.
The Iraqiya list has said it will still participate in the election despite the boycott by one of its members.
"The list believes that the best reaction [against the candidate ban] is wide participation in the coming election and for our list to achieve a great win and to make forward-looking change," Maysoun al-Damalouji, a spokeswoman for Iraqiya, said.
The ban on candidates over Baath Party links has fanned Sunni fears of a plot by Iraq's Shia ruling parties to marginalize them again ahead of the vote.
PHOTO CAPTION
An Iraqi man walks past posters with a symbolic X across for the Iraqi lawmaker Dhafir al-Ani, a Sunni politician who has been barred from running in the election because of alleged ties to the Baath party, in Najaf, south of Baghdad, Iraq.
Agencies