Iraq's main Sunni Arab political bloc today demanded it head a parliamentary committee to amend the constitution in a row over the amount of power it gives Shias and Kurds.
Iraq's parliament is set to meet tomorrow for its first day of normal business since being elected in December to discuss forming a committee to review the constitution - one of postwar Iraq's most sensitive sectarian issues.
Keen to bring the minority Sunni community into the political process, the United States brokered a deal among Iraq's diverse groups last year that allows for a parliamentary committee to review the charter.
"It's a matter of logic that the Iraqi Accordance Front heads the committee that will revise the constitution in parliament because the demand of rewriting the constitution was a demand made by the Front," Iyad al-Samarrai, a senior official of the Front, the main Sunni parliamentary group, said.
Under the deal, parliament must form a committee which will have four months to come up with recommendations on how to amend the constitution. The deliberations are likely to reopen some of the rifts that delayed the parliament's sitting.
US Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad mediated the deal shortly before an October referendum on the constitution and although ratified, there was strong opposition in predominantly Sunni provinces.
Sunni insurgents have waged a sustained violent campaign since Saddam was deposed.
Moderate Sunnis fear the charter's provisions for regional autonomy may give Kurds and Shias control over Iraq's oil reserves and could break up the country.