Afghan president's brother withdraws from election, backs ex-minister --- (Reuters) - The Afghan president's older brother, Qayum Karzai, announced on Wednesday he was withdrawing from next month's presidential election and would back former foreign minister Zalmai Rassoul. -- The alliance is the first public acknowledgement of weeks of negotiations aimed at consolidating the voting bloc of Pashtuns, the country's largest ethnic group, and brings together two candidates considered close to the current president. -- The pullout was widely anticipated after Karzai failed to show up for a televised debate this week. -- "I will go to every mosque, every room and every guesthouse to get this team elected," Karzai told Reuters on the sidelines of a conference after announcing his withdrawal. -- "We are hoping to win on the first round. This team represents the only hope for stability in this country." -- Rassoul said negotiations on the election alliance had been taking place for two to three weeks. -- "This is good for Afghanistan and good for democracy," he said. -- The Karzai-Rassoul alliance will help consolidate that voting bloc and the supporters of the current government. -- "We expect other candidates to join us before the election," said Mahmood Karzai, another of the president's brothers. "I'm thinking of at least three candidates." -- He declined to name them, but the printed version of his brother's announcement pulling out of the race gave a clue. It said Qayum Karzai would join "the teams of Doctor Zalmai Rassoul and Abdul Rahim Wardak". -- Mahmood Karzai said his brother Qayum and Rassoul would campaign separately in order to cover the widest possible area. - More, at: http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/03/06/us-afghanistan-election-idUSBREA250BS20140306