BAGHDAD, Iraq - In the highly charged and fractious climate of today's Iraq, bringing together a representative group to write a new constitution is an enormous challenge. Producing a document that satisfies everyone may prove to be even more difficult.

Chief among the problems is the crucial question of how to include Sunni Arabs in the process to lend it credibility and meet US demands.

But Sunni Arabs, politically marginalized because of their boycott of January's historic elections, are setting tough conditions for their participation in the constitutional process, something that threatens to slow down the process and stoke existing tensions between them and the country's Shiite and Kurdish majority that dominates parliament and the government.

Iraq's 275-member National Assembly has until August 15 to draft a new constitution, which will be put to a nationwide vote two months later. If adopted, it will provide the basis for a general election by December 15, concluding a US-sponsored political process spanning nearly two years starting with the adoption in March last year of an interim constitution.

Riding on the proposed document is the future of Iraq, a country whose vast natural resources make it potentially wealthy; but its ethnic, religious and tribal faultlines render it prone to sectarian conflicts and secessionist sentiments.

"The goal is to arrive at a constitution that will be accepted in October," said Hummam Hammoudi, a Shiite cleric who heads a parliamentary committee mandated to draft the document.

"What we're after is a document that has a vision for Iraq's future, power-sharing and gives assurances to everyone that their rights are safeguarded and their chances are equal," he said.

Tough mission

Like virtually every walk of public life in Iraq since Saddam Hussein's ouster, sectarian politics have cast a shadow on the constitutional process as soon as it got underway with the creation last month of Hammoudi's committee. The two-year, Sunni-dominated insurgency also bears on the process, indirectly giving some Sunni groups with ties to the insurgency some leverage.

If unhappy with the outcome, the Sunni Arabs can undermine the process by voting against the constitution draft in the four provinces where they enjoy a majority. Under the interim constitution, if three of Iraq's 18 provinces vote by a two-third majority against the draft in the October referendum, parliament must be dissolved and a new election held.

Already, the Shiite majority on Hammoudi's 55-lawmaker committee have balked at Sunni Arab conditions for joining, including demands for the admission of as many as 25 to the committee and giving them voting rights equal to those enjoyed by the lawmakers.

"We are the ones who have taken part in the electoral process and these are our exclusive rights," said Bahaa al-Aaraji, a Shiite deputy and the committee's co-ordinator.

"We already have started to write the constitution and will not wait for the Sunnis to give us their list of nominees," he said, striking a note of impatience.

With little more than two months left before the deadline for drafting the document, he said 13 would be the ideal number of Sunni Arabs joining the committee. The 13, he explained, would join two Sunni Arab lawmakers on the committee, bringing the total to 15, the same number of Kurdish members. Iraq's Kurds and Sunni Arabs account for a roughly similar share - about 20 per cent - of Iraq's estimated 26 million people. The Shiites comprise about 60 per cent.

'Positive' attitude

The committee's own set of conditions for accepting Sunni Arabs may not go down well either.

Former senior members of Saddam's now-disbanded Baath party will not be admitted, said al-Aaraji. Sunni candidates also must have a publicly stated "positive" attitude toward the political process and enjoy the support of their communities. There also must be a single list of nominees, he added.

Sunni leaders, meanwhile, are complaining that a counter insurgency campaign by US-backed Iraqi forces in Baghdad and areas around has poisoned the political climate by targeting their community. Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari's government, they insist, must introduce confidence-building measures to reassure the community and aid the constitutional process.

At least 1,000 terror suspects have been detained since the May 30 start of the crackdown, dubbed Operation Lightening and carried out by 40,000 Iraqi troops.

The Association of Muslim Scholars, an influential Sunni group with ties to some insurgency factions, has said it doesn't want anything to do with the constitutional process so as not to give legitimacy to the January 30 election, according to spokesman Abdul-Salam al-Kobeisi.

"We should not take steps that provide coverage for the occupation," he said.

(Agencies via Xinhua)