Influential Iraqi group threatens to skip poll

A POLITICAL group including leading members of Iraq's Sunni minority has threatened to boycott national polls in March after one of their leaders was targeted for alleged ties to Saddam Hussein's Baath party.

The Iraqi List, headed by Vice President Tareq al-Hashemi, a Sunni Arab, former Prime Minister Iyad Allawi, a secular Shia, and MP Saleh al-Mutlaq, an influential secular Sunni politician, blasted the decision from an independent state committee to ban Mutlaq from the elections.

It is feared that a boycott from leading Sunni politicians like Mutlaq and Hashemi could cut off wider participation from Iraqi Sunnis, which would be a grave setback as Iraq seeks to solidify security gains ahead of the US troop drawdown.

The United States has vowed to halt combat operations this summer and withdraw its troops entirely by 2012.

"The leaders (of the Iraqi List) call all those involved to correct this grave mistake as soon as possible in order to maintain the positive electoral atmosphere," the group's leadership said in a statement aired late last Friday.

The statement came a day after the government's Justice and Accountability Commission, which is responsible for ensuring the constitutionally banned Baath party does not return to Iraqi politics, barred Mutlaq and the National Dialogue Front he heads because of unspecified links to or support for the Baath Party.

"If this (ban) is enacted, the leaders of the list and its allies will reconsider their participation in the election, which could jeopardise the electoral and political process," a spokesman said. Many Sunnis, forced from dominance after Saddam's ouster, boycotted the last parliamentary election in 2005, marginalising them at a vulnerable moment and fuelling sectarian violence. Securing true political participation from not just Iraq's newly empowered Shia majority but also minority Sunnis and Kurds is seen as key to ensuring violence does not erupt anew.

But it is unclear what the edict from the commission, which banned Mutlaq and a dozen other groupings, will have given the stalemate over the commission's leadership and a larger battle over how best to deal with former Baath party members.

The government and parliament have not been able to agree on new leadership for the committee for over a year, and members of parliament have accused Shia Premier Maliki's government of dragging its feet in welcoming former Baathists. Reuters