IRAQ: Gunmen assassinated an Iraqi member of parliament yesterday in a fresh shock to politicians whose failure to form a government three months after elections has allowed violence to thrive unchecked.
Iraqi police said Lame'a Abed Khadawi, a member of caretaker Prime Minister Iyad Allawi's political party, was shot dead outside her house in east Baghdad. She is the first person in the 275-seat National Assembly to be killed.
Ms Khadawi was one of about 90 women elected to the assembly at the end of January. By law, a third of the candidates on party lists had to be women.
Pressure has mounted on Iraq's politicians to end months of post-election bickering. America's top general urged them on Tuesday to form a new government quickly to combat an insurgency he said was as strong as it had been a year ago.
Prime minister-designate Ibrahim al-Jaafari told reporters he had sent his proposed cabinet list to the three-man presidential council for approval. It is expected to go before the National Assembly for a vote today. Mr Jaafari said seven women would be included in what is expected to be a cabinet of 32 or 33 ministers.
Hopes of announcing a government have repeatedly been dashed during three months of squabbling over the distribution of ministries to rival sects. Politicians had hoped the election would lead Iraq to stability and economic recovery.
Gen Richard Myers, chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, told a Pentagon briefing yesterday that speeding up the political process would be the best way to weaken a relentless insurgency
Despite nearly 140,000 US troops and a similar number of Iraqi forces, guerrillas have the same capability to attack as they did a year ago, staging 50 or 60 attacks a day, Gen Myers said.
The general and US Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld noted a recent rise in violence coinciding with the political impasse.
Iraq's al-Qaeda wing said it had killed two Interior Ministry officials in an ambush on their car in west Baghdad yesterday, according to an internet statement.
The group said it had killed Lieut Jihad La'eebee, his son, who was also an Interior Ministry official, and three bodyguards. The statement could not be immediately authenticated.
Iraq's newly powerful Shias and Kurds have been promising to form a government that will also give Sunnis, who lost their grip on power with the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, an important role in running the country. But Sunni leaders are unhappy with their allotment of ministries.
Iraqi officials fear insurgents have benefited from the wrangling over key ministries such as defence, interior and oil, each of which is coveted by Shia, Kurdish and Sunni leaders.
Meanwhile, the captors of three Romanian journalists have threatened to kill them on Wednesday unless Bucharest withdraws its troops.