BAGHDAD - Forty to sixty Iraqi insurgents mounted a brazen assault on the US-run Abu Ghraib prison Saturday night hours before Iraq's new parliament was due to meet to try to break a stalemate on forming a government.
At least 20 American soldiers and 12 prisoners were wounded when Abu Ghraib prison west of Baghdad came under insurgent attack, the US military said.
US forces "repelled an attack by 40 to 60 insurgents on Forward Operating Base Abu Ghraib at approximately 7:00 pm (1500 GMT)," a statement read.
Insurgents detonated two car bombs, followed by rocket-propelled grenades, small arms fire and 20 mortar rounds in the western Baghdad suburb, it said, with a US military spokesman later saying the battle lasted 40 minutes.
The prison, which was at the centre of a detainee abuse scandal last year, is now secure, the military said without providing further details.
The attack was the boldest assault in months on a US military facility and the biggest show of force by rebels in the capital since January 30 elections. A mortar attack last April on Abu Ghraib prison claimed the lives of 23 Iraqi prisoners.
While the election has been hailed as pivotal point in the battle against the insurgency, Iraq's political players have risked squandering their momentum as the country's Shiites, Kurds and Sunnis have quarreled for two months over assembling a government.
As the 275-national assembly readied for its third session Sunday, MPs braced for a potentially ugly exchange between Shiite and Sunni MPs over the post of parliament speaker after the legislative body's second meeting four days ago broke up in anger.
The leaders of Iraq's Shiite majority on Saturday issued an ultimatum for Sunni MPs to accept a compromise nominee for the post of parliament speaker after the Sunnis had failed to pick a candidate last Tuesday amid internal tensions and resentment over the power of the top vote-getting Shiites and Kurds.
The Shiite United Iraqi Alliance (UIA), which controls 146 seats in the 275-member parliament, said it would veto flamboyant Sunni MP Mishaan al-Juburi and told Sunnis who did not like the decision to leave the assembly.
"We have agreed on the nominees, and the candidate for the speakership has been endorsed by a majority of Sunnis," Jawad al-Maliki, a senior member of the UIA, told AFP.
He was referring to Hajem al-Hassani, a compromise candidate more acceptable to Shiites, who maintains he is only interested in the post as a last resort.
"If there is a minority of Sunnis that does not agree with the choice, well, they are free to withdraw from the assembly."
Hassani's office declined to comment.
But a spokesman for Ghazi al-Yawar, Iraq's outgoing president and member of the same parliamentary list as Hassani, hinted that it was a done deal after the UIA and the Kurds weighed in in favour of the outgoing industry minister who studied and lived for 20 years in the United States.
"If it is going to solve the crisis, then we welcome it," he said, adding that Yawar was seeking the vice presidency, another post reserved for Sunnis.
Another UIA member, Ali al-Dabbagh, said there was broad consensus on Hassani in the new assembly guaranteeing him the job.
But Juburi has refused to withdraw his candidacy to be speaker despite a firm rejection by the UIA on Thursday citing his alleged links to the ousted Sunni-dominated regime of Saddam Hussein.
"I am merely a foot soldier and the faithful son of the Sunnis who is carrying out their wishes," Juburi told AFP.
Elder statesman Adnan al-Pachachi said that the National Front, a loose grouping of more than 30 Sunni political and religious groups, was still backing Juburi's candidacy.
Pachachi also announced his candidacy for the vice presidency in competition with Yawar and Sherif Ali, the heir to the monarchy overthrown in 1958.
The community largely boycotted the January election, both out of anger over the 2003 US-led invasion and out of fear of insurgent attack, and as a result Sunni Arab factions have just 16 MPs in parliament.
The decision has left the Sunnis in a position of weakness, as Iraq's Kurds, who are equal to them in size, have 77 parliament seats and are pushing for a larger share of cabinet posts.
In other developments, insurgents killed four policemen and one civilian in a car bomb on a highway 20 kilometres (15 miles) north of Baghdad, security and medical sources said.
The US military announced the death of a US marine killed by small arms fire in the strife-torn western city of Ramadi Friday.
In Mosul, six people were wounded by a car bomb that set a house on fire, the US military said, without elaborating on the target of the attack. It was the fourth car bomb in Mosul in five days.

04/02/2005 20:49 GMT