Congo's main opposition party, whose leader left the country this week after fighting in the capital, has suspended participation in the lower house of parliament, citing security concerns.
Members of the Movement for the Liberation of Congo (MLC) of defeated presidential candidate Jean-Pierre Bemba have complained of harassment and intimidation by security forces since government troops routed his soldiers last month.
"We, the elected representatives of the opposition, consider the current climate of permanent insecurity does not permit us to work in the serenity that the mandate of a member of parliament requires," MLC National Executive Secretary Thomas Luhaka said in a statement today.
"This is why ... we feel obliged to suspend, effective now and until further notice, our participation in the work of this [National] Assembly, until proper security conditions are established."
Mr Luhaka said the decision followed the looting by a dozen members of the Republican Guard of the home of an MLC parliamentarian on Thursday night which he said was part of a "targeted and programmed operation" against MLC members.
The public prosecutor has asked the Senate upper house to lift the immunity his party leader enjoys as a member so he can face charges over last month's violence, in which hundreds were killed.
Mr Bemba, who went to Portugal on Wednesday for medical treatment, lost a run-off vote to President Joseph Kabila last year in the nation's first free elections in over 40 years.
It was hoped the poll would cement a years-long peace process after a 1998-2003 war but fighting broke out last month when Mr Bemba's bodyguards, numbering several hundred fighters, defied a government order to disarm under a plan to cut his security detail to 12 policemen.
On Tuesday, public prosecutor Tshimanga Mukeba sought to to prosecute him as the "intellectual author" of the violence in the capital, which is believed to have left up to 600 dead.
The charges against him include threatening internal state security, murder, armed robbery and destruction of property.
Congo's UN peacekeeping mission last week denounced acts of aggression and intimidation against opposition figures.