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Baghdad --
In the first sign that Iraq's leaders may yet halt a sectarian political crisis that has raised fears of civil war, Iraq's Sunni leaders said Sunday that they would end their boycott of parliament.
The Iraqiya coalition, a largely Sunni-backed group of lawmakers that won the most seats in the 2010 parliamentary elections but was unable to build a governing coalition, will return to parliament, said spokeswoman Maysoon al-Damluji.
The move does not signal the end of Iraq's political crisis, which erupted days after the withdrawal of the U.S. military last month when Iraqiya announced its boycott to protest what it saw as moves by the Shiite-dominated government to sideline Sunnis from power. Those underlying issues have not been resolved.
But the group's decision eases tensions and paves the way for the political leadership to hold a national summit meeting to discuss reconciliation among Iraq's three main ethnic factions - Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds.
However, Iraqiya said a separate boycott of Cabinet meetings, which has paralyzed the government, is still in place.
The concession came a day after Vice President Joe Biden made another round of calls to Iraqiya leaders, urging them to return to parliament so the leadership could hold a national conference.
The crisis flared in December just as U.S. troops were leaving the country after nearly nine years of war and occupation, and represented an embarrassing turn of events for the Obama administration, which emphasized Iraq's democratic progress in trumpeting the troop withdrawal.
But the drama has laid bare the unfinished business of America's war, which upended generations of rule by a Sunni-dominated authoritarian regime. The war ushered in rule by the Shiite majority, but the two sects, which fought a brutal civil war in 2006 and 2007, have been unable to fully reconcile.
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In the first sign that Iraq's leaders may yet halt a sectarian political crisis that has raised fears of civil war, Iraq's Sunni leaders said Sunday that they would end their boycott of parliament.
The Iraqiya coalition, a largely Sunni-backed group of lawmakers that won the most seats in the 2010 parliamentary elections but was unable to build a governing coalition, will return to parliament, said spokeswoman Maysoon al-Damluji.
The move does not signal the end of Iraq's political crisis, which erupted days after the withdrawal of the U.S. military last month when Iraqiya announced its boycott to protest what it saw as moves by the Shiite-dominated government to sideline Sunnis from power. Those underlying issues have not been resolved.
But the group's decision eases tensions and paves the way for the political leadership to hold a national summit meeting to discuss reconciliation among Iraq's three main ethnic factions - Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds.
However, Iraqiya said a separate boycott of Cabinet meetings, which has paralyzed the government, is still in place.
The concession came a day after Vice President Joe Biden made another round of calls to Iraqiya leaders, urging them to return to parliament so the leadership could hold a national conference.
The crisis flared in December just as U.S. troops were leaving the country after nearly nine years of war and occupation, and represented an embarrassing turn of events for the Obama administration, which emphasized Iraq's democratic progress in trumpeting the troop withdrawal.
But the drama has laid bare the unfinished business of America's war, which upended generations of rule by a Sunni-dominated authoritarian regime. The war ushered in rule by the Shiite majority, but the two sects, which fought a brutal civil war in 2006 and 2007, have been unable to fully reconcile.
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