Radical Iraqi Shia leader Moqtada al-Sadr has said he would present a joint list of candidates with Sunni Arabs in the volatile al-Anbar governorate to contest the 15 December legislative elections.
Sadr's organisation on Wednesday said it decided to ally itself with the Sunnis due to "the difficult situation facing the country, to prevent the occupier and enemies of Iraq from attaining their goals, to consolidate national identity and to reaffirm its unity".
Sadr and his followers vehemently oppose the US-led occupation of Iraq, and have aligned with Sunni Arabs who are believed to form the backbone of the persistent anti-US street war in Iraq.
Al-Anbar is the most volatile province in Iraq and includes the Iraqi fighters' strongholds of Ramadi and Fallujah, which overwhelmingly rejected the Iraqi constitution that was approved by referendum on 15 October.
Sadr's office, in a statement released in the Shia holy city of Najaf south of Baghdad, said: "The deputy Fattah al-Sheikh has been designated to form a list in al-Anbar for the elections."
Shaikh told AFP he would "run in al-Anbar at the head of a list that includes eight Sunni candidates.
"Consultations have taken place in recent days to create a national Islamic force" to run against a secular bloc being mooted by former prime minister Iyad Allawi, he said.
The talks are continuing, he added.
Three Iraqi Sunni parties announced on Wednesday they are forming a coalition to run in the next elections on 15 December.
constitution despite opposition from the Sunni Arab elite.
Arab country," he added, according to the official SPA news agency.
and more narrowly rejected in a third.
government for the first time in Iraq's modern history.
to a strict interpretation of Islam and regard the Shia as an aberration.
Iraqi Interior Minister Bayan Baqer Sulagh who is himself a Shia and follower of Iraq-based Iranian Shia cleric Ali Sistani.
democracy and equality," Emir Sheikh Jaber al-Ahmad al-Sabah said.
"more understanding, solidarity and unity" among the Iraqi people.
seven months later by a US-led international coalition.