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The Accountability and Justice Commission barred 500 candidates from running, mostly on the grounds of ties to Saddam Hussein's Baath Party. Biden proposed as a compromise that all candidates should be allowed to run in the March election and only the winners would be vetted, The New York Times reported.

Faraj al-Haidari, who heads the independent electoral commission, said the disqualified candidates come from all parties and are about evenly split between Sunni and Shiite.

The Times said the two big secular coalitions appear to have lost the most candidates. Iraqiya, a coalition whose leaders include Vice President Tariq Hashimi, had 72 candidates disqualified.

Hashimi says the Accountability and Justice Commission is illegal.

The commission's heads are Ali Faisal al-Lami and Ahmed Chalabi. Lami was released from prison in August after being arrested on suspicion of being linked to bombings, while Chalabi, a former U.S. protege, is now believed to have ties to Iran, the newspaper said.

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