ANKARA - Two small parties from Turkey's fractured right on Friday agreed to an electoral alliance in next month's legislative elections in order to better challenge to the Islamist-rooted ruling party, a party official said.
Under the deal, the Motherland Party (ANAP) pulled out of the July 22 elections in favour of the Democrat Party (DP), ANAP parliamentary group deputy chairman Suleyman Saribas told reporters.
"We are withdrawing from the elections... so as not to divide the centre-right," Saribas said. "We will ask our grassroots to vote for the DP."
Saribas said some ANAP candidates would appear on the DP lists, but the Anatolia news agency reported that ANAP later reversed its decision and will not field any candidates.
Last month, ANAP and the True Path Party (DYP) said they were planning to merge ahead of the elections under the name DP to mount a stronger challenge against Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan's Justice and Development Party (AKP).
But the merger appeared headed for failure last week when ANAP leader Erkan Mumcu accused DYP leader Mehmet Agar, whose party changed its name to DP, of not honouring the terms of the agreement.
Officials from both parties held several meetings since the start of the week in hopes of saving their much-touted alliance.
Saribas said the two parties still intend to merge after the elections.
Turkey's main opposition Republican People's Party CHP) and the smaller Democratic Left Party (DSP) also struck a similar deal to unite the centre-left.
The opposition alliances are driven by a 10-percent national threshold that left all mainstream parties except the CHP outside parliament in the 2002 elections, allowing the AKP to hold nearly two-thirds of the seats with little over one-third of the popular vote.
The AKP was born out of a now-defunct Islamist party, but says it has disawoved its Islamist past and is now committed to the country's secular order and pro-Western path.
Many, however, suspect the party of seeking to increase the influence of Islam in Turkey and undermine the strict separation of state and religion.
06/08/2007 13:54 GMT