Violence continues as Iraqi parties struggle to reach deal on government

SIX police officers were killed and 15 wounded in car bomb attacks on Iraq’s security services, as political factions wrangled over putting together a government.

Attackers shot and killed the police chief of the central Iraqi town of Budayr early yesterday, the Polish military said. A woman was also wounded in the attack.

The Shi'ite dominated United Iraqi Alliance and a Kurdish coalition, which emerged from the January 30 elections with the two biggest blocks of seats in the National Assembly, made little headway in their talks on combining forces to select the leaders of the new government.

Meanwhile, interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi, whose party finished third, denied rumours he had given up his effort to stitch together support from other groups, including the Kurds, that would allow him to remain in the post of prime minister.

Forming Iraq's first democratically elected government is a key step in the US plan for stabilising the country, and insurgents have been striking at Iraqi police and military forces seeking to undermine the effort.

Two suicide car bombs exploded outside the Interior Ministry on Thursday in eastern Baghdad, killing at least five policemen and wounding nine.

Another car bomb targeted a police convoy in Baqouba, 35 miles northeast of the capital, and killed one Iraqi policeman and a civilian.

Violence that has killed hundreds of people the past three weeks led Mr Allawi on Thursday to extend a state of emergency until the end of March. First announced nearly four months ago, the order affects all of Iraq except Kurdish-run areas in the north.

The emergency decree includes a night-time curfew and gives the government extra powers to make arrests without warrants and launch police and military operations when it deems necessary.

More than a month after the elections, negotiations between the cleric-supported United Iraqi Alliance and the coalition of Kurdish parties are struggling and plans for convening the 275-member National Assembly this week have been suspended.

The United Iraqi Alliance won 140-seats and wants the leader of its Islamic Dawa party, Ibrahim al-Jaafari, to be the next prime minister. But it needs the support of 42 other deputies to elect a president the first step in selecting a prime minister.

"Everyone's bewildered. It's hard to reach a solution. There should be compromises for a solution to be reached," said Ali Faisal of the Shi'ite Political Council, a member of the alliance.

The Kurdish coalition, an alliance between Jalal Talabani's Patriotic Union of Kurdistan and Masoud Barzani's Kurdish Democratic Party, has 75 seats and thus is a key player in political negotiations.

Mr Talabani and Mr Barzani told reporters in Irbil on Thursday that they will ally with whichever groups support their demands to expand the autonomous Kurdish region and to retain control over their Peshmerga militias.

Mr Barzani said talks were continuing with other parties but refused to comment on their substance, describing the task of forming a government as a "laborious operation that takes time and effort."

Mr Allawi, whose party won 40 seats, also has been courting the Kurds as well as other political parties, including the communists, in an effort to remain head of the government.

There were rumours that Mr Allawi was dropping his bid, but his spokesman, Thaer al-Naqib, denied that. He said Mr Allawi was "still a strong candidate" for the premiership.