PRIME MINISTER OPTIMISTIC OVER CONSTITUTION”¦NEW ATTACK IN BAQUBA

IRAQ, Iraqi prime minister Ibrahim Jaafari says there are only a few items of dissent left in the text of the new constitution presented to the National Assembly yesterday, even as the latter decided to take a few more days before submitting it to a vote. "We agree on 151 articles concerning federalism, regions, provinces" said Jaafari in a press conference in Baghdad, without specifying which points are still in question. Yesterday night, the president of parliament, Hajem al-Hassani, said that the contrast is over federalism " Sunnis fear it will lead to the ultimate destruction of Iraq and create uneven resource distribution such as”¦oh, oil for instance.

References to the Baath party also raised questions. The question of the division of powers among the president, prime minister and head of the National Assembly also remain in contention. Currently a Kurd, a Shiite and a Sunni respectively hold those positions. Meanwhile, more blood was shed in Iraq today as a suicide bomber set himself off in a joint coordination centre, killing seven people including 2 US soldiers and an Iraqi police officer and 4 employees. Previously other sources spoke of 8 dead aong the police alone. Two more officers were killed in an attack in Haydariya, 30 km south of Najaf. The Iraqi minister for the environment, Kurdish Narmin Othman, said she escaped from an attack against the convoy in which she was she was traveling to Suleimaniyah, north of di Baghdad, during which three of his bodyguards were hit. [AB]

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