OSLO, March 20 (Xinhua) -- Norway's justice minister Sylvi Listhaug of the right-wing Progress Party announced her resignation on Tuesday to avert a crisis that might topple the Conservative-led minority government.
"It's been completely up to myself to decide whether I would resign or not," Listhaug wrote on Facebook ahead of a parliament session in which she looked set to lose a confidence vote.
The controversial minister wrote that she "cannot allow" the Progress Party to lose power and influence.
The confidence vote, which had been scheduled for later Tuesday, came after Listhaug made a Facebook post on March 9 accusing the main opposition Labour Party of putting "terrorists' rights" above national security.
She made the comments after Labour and some other parties defeated a bill that allows the state to strip the citizenship of Norwegians who are suspected of terrorism without a court hearing.
The Facebook post, which contained a photo showing armed and masked militants, sparked a storm of criticism because Labour members had been the main targets in the terrorist attacks in Norway on July 22, 2011, that killed 77 people.
Listhaug was forced to apologize in parliament last week and deleted the Facebook post on the grounds of copyright issues. However, opposition parties said her apology was not sincere enough and supported a vote of no-confidence against her.
The small Christian Democratic Party, which holds the balance of power and has been mostly supportive of Prime Minister Erna Solberg's government, said on Monday it had lost confidence in Listhaug as the justice minister.
Local media had reported earlier that the prime minister intended to announce that the government, consisting of the Conservative Party, the Progress Party and the Liberal Party, would resign if the no-confidence vote is passed.
