Police in the Kurdish autonomous region in northern Iraq said they had arrested the leader of the main opposition party who would appear in court for a hearing on Wednesday.

Businessman turned politician Shaswar Abdulwahid leads the New Generation party, which holds 15 of the 100 seats in the region's parliament and provides the main opposition to the two former rebel movements which have dominated Kurdish politics for decades.

He was arrested on a court warrant in his home in the region's second city Sulaimaniyah on Tuesday and will appear before the court on Wednesday, police spokesman Sarkout Ahmed said.

A court official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Abdulwahid had been sentenced in absentia to six months in prison after repeatedly failing to appear at hearings into a defamation complaint from a former lawmaker.

At Wednesday's hearing, the court is expected to drop the jail sentence for failing to appear but may remand Abdulwahid in custody while he awaits trial for defamation. He could also ask to be released on bail.

New Generation slammed its leader's arrest as a ploy to sabotage a major action planned for next week to address the salary arrears endured by the region's civil servants.

Abdulwahid has been arrested several times since he launched the party in 2017. He was also wounded in an assassination attempt.

The ruling alliance of the Kurdistan Democratic Party and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan has been criticised by human rights groups for its intolerance of dissent and its resort to arbitrary arrests.

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