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Canada Liberal leader Dion quits after election defeat
(Xinhua)
Updated: 2008-10-21 16:07

OTTAWA -- Leader of Canada's Liberal Party Stephane Dion announced Monday he will quit his post, following his party's defeat in last week's parliamentary election.

At a press conference in Ottawa, Dion said he would stay on until a new leader can be chosen at a convention, which he has requested and is likely to be held in the first half of next year.

He acknowledged responsibility for the party's humiliating defeat in the Oct. 14 election, but stressed that other problems within the party need also to be addressed.

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"I will stay as leader until a new leader is chosen at a leadership convention that I have asked the party to begin to organize. I will not be a candidate for the leadership of my party at that convention," he said.

"I will remain as leader in order to ensure a smooth and successful transition."

In the worst results in terms of popular vote for the Liberal Party in its history of more than 100 years, the Liberals took only 76 seats in the election. Before the election, the party held95 seats.

The Liberals captured only 26.2 percent of the popular vote, two points lower than the party's disastrous 1984 finish with John Turner at the helm and only four points ahead of the party's worst-ever results in 1867.

Dion, a French speaker who sometimes has trouble making himself understood in English, hampered his party's election chances by stressing the need for a carbon tax to cut greenhouse gas emissions at a time of high fuel prices and market turmoil.

There have been calls from within the party for him to resign after the election. Complaints had also risen during the election campaign saying he had not enough communications with Liberal candidates.

The former professor of politics won the Liberal leadership in December 2006.