Iraq's president said Thursday he has asked the country's highest legal body to determine the legitimacy of a committee that banned candidates with suspected ties to Saddam Hussein's Sunni-led regime from running in parliamentary elections due March 7. President Jalal Talabani said the three-member presidential council he leads has sent a letter to the head of the Higher Judicial Council requesting a ruling after the committee banned 511 candidates in a move that has dealt a setback to national reconciliation efforts and threatens to cast a shadow over the vote. “I myself am not satisfied with the banning decision,” said Talabani, a Kurd who has strongly backed reconciliation between Iraq's main Shiite, Sunni and Kurdish groups. He told reporters he was seeking a ruling on “whether this committee that issued the decision is legitimate or not.” The government-sanctioned body behind the ban - the Accountability and Justice Committee - is tasked with weeding out from the government and security forces hardcore supporters of Saddam's outlawed Baath party. That body faced Sunni charges that it acted with excessive zeal in purging Baathists, many of whom had joined the party to promote their careers or protect themselves from the regime. It is led by Ali Al-Lami, a Shiite once detained by the US military over a 2008 attack in a Shiite district of Baghdad. The attack targeted US forces and was blamed on Shiite militiamen.
