Formal Iraqi government in one month?

BAGHDAD, Nov. 11 (UPI) -- The new Iraqi government will be formed within one month of the start of a Thursday parliamentary meeting, a Kurdish leader declared.

Iraq ended an eight-month political deadlock in a late Wednesday power-sharing agreement that lays out the leadership of a new government.

Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki is expected to retain his leadership position, as would Kurdish leader Jalal Talabani, the president of Iraq. The speaker of parliament would go to the secular Iraqiya slate, which won the March 7 election by two seats but only took 91 positions in the 325 member Council of Representatives.

Iyad Allawi, a former interim prime minister and leader of Iraqiya, may emerge as the head of a National Council for Strategic Policy, which could check the power of the prime minister.

Massoud Barzani, the president of the Kurdistan Regional Government, said Thursday the "future government shall be formed within one month from the date of the Parliament meeting," the Voices of Iraq news agency quoted him as saying.

The power-sharing deal came amid national and international jockeying that saw anti-American Shiite cleric Moqtada Sadr and his Iranian hosts emerge as influential in the new Iraq.

Allawi had pushed for months to take the position of prime minister, though Barzani said the Iraqiya slate would bear "great responsibility" by appointing a parliamentary speaker.

The Kurdish leader, however, said it was "still too early" to examine the distribution of ministers and the share each of the leading parties will take in a new Iraqi government.