The head of the committee drafting Iraq's constitution said yesterday that three days are not enough to win over the Sunni Arabs, and the document they rejected may ultimately have to be approved by parliament as it is and submitted to the people in a referendum.

　　Iraqi leaders completed a draft on Monday night and submitted it to parliament, but with only minutes to go before a midnight deadline, they delayed a vote to give them time to convince Sunni Arab negotiators to accept it.

　　Us ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad urged the Iraqis to work "in spirit of compromise" and "take the national interest into account" when they resume talks today.

　　He said "every effort needs to be made" to win Sunni Arab support for the draft and that it "behooves" Iraq's other communities - Shiites and Kurds - to "reach out" to the Sunnis in the interest of national unity.

　　At a news conference yesterday, drafting committee chairman Humam Hammoudi acknowledged that three days would probably be too short to win over Sunnis, who objected to wording on federalism, Saddam Hussein's Baath Party, the description of Iraq as an Islamic - but not Arab - country, and other parts of the document.

　　Asked how to break the impasse, Hammoudi said, "the Iraqi people will rule" and suggested that the elected parliament could debate the issues and take a decision. Shiites and Kurds, who accepted the agreement, dominate the assembly.

　　Approving the draft and submitting it to voters in an October 15 referendum risks a backlash among Sunni Arabs, who are at the forefront of the insurgency. Luring them away from violence and into the political process was a major US goal for the constitution.

　　But hammoudi noted that unlike the Shiite and Kurd negotiators, the Sunni Arabs were not elected parliament members but were appointed to the committee. Sunni Arabs won only 17 of the 275 parliament seats because so many Sunnis boycotted the January 30 election.

　　"Those who are representing the brother Sunni Arabs are not elected," Hammoudi said. "Therefore, who can say that they really represent the people on the street ... therefore the Sunnis have to express their opinion."

　　Prime minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari, a Shiite, appeared to make an overture to the minority.

　　"Some of the political groups have some reservations and we will study them and try to reach a solution in the next three days," he said in Baghdad yesterday.

　　The wrangling over the constitution came as violence persisted in Iraq. A US Marine was killed on Monday when a roadside bomb exploded near his vehicle near the troubled city of Fallujah, the military said.

　　The latest death brought to at least 65 the number of American troops killed in Iraq this month. At least 1,871 US troops have died since the Iraq war started in 2003, according to an Associated Press count.

　　Fallujah, 65 kilometers west of Baghdad, was devastated in November when the Marines retook it from guerrillas and has been the scene of increasingly frequent clashes.

　　Monday night's last-minute scrambling by the constitutional committee came one week after the original August 15 deadline.

　　The 15 Sunni members of the drafting committee issued a statement saying they had rejected the proposal because the government and the committee did not abide by an agreement for consensus. They said agreement on the document was still far off.

　　(The Associated Press)