(AP) Five-term incumbent Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, will face a challenge from a distant member of his own family, Green Party candidate Julian Hatch, in the November 2006 election.

The Green Party of Utah announced Friday that the 51-year-old environmental activist and disabled veteran accepted the party's nomination at a convention this week.

"I am opposing my own relative so citizens of Utah will finally have a real choice since Democrats have adopted so many Republican policy positions in recent years," said Hatch, a lifelong Utah resident. He works as the state's coordinator for the Western Watersheds Project, a public lands policy group based in Hailey, Idaho.

Julian Hatch opposes the war in Iraq and will also campaign for abortion rights, affordable health care, tax reform and public land protection.

"We are building a populist third party to challenge the ruling two-party system that has become immersed in big money and entrenched in fascist ideology," he said.