In the deadliest attack, a roadside bomb killed three soldiers in a town south of the ethnically mixed northern oil hub of Kirkuk, police Colonel Ahmed al-Barazanchi said.

"An IED (improvised explosive device) earlier today hit a dismounted army patrol in Rashad," he said. "Three soldiers were killed."

Also near Kirkuk in the town of Leylan, a drive-by shooting killed a civilian, Barazanchi said. It was unclear why the victim was targeted.

Kirkuk, 240 kilometres (150 miles) north of Baghdad, lies at the heart of an oil-producing province which is at the centre of a dispute between Arabs, Turkmen and Kurds.

In the city of Mosul further north, a suicide bomber blew up a vehicle at a joint police-army checkpoint killing a soldier and wounding four other people, including a soldier and a policeman, police said.

Gunmen also killed a shopkeeper in the city centre of Mosul while two other people were wounded when a roadside bomb went off near a police checkpoint, police said.

While violence has dropped across Iraq since its peak in 2006 and 2007, Mosul remains one of the country's most unstable cities.

Separate drive-by shootings in towns in the confessionally mixed central province of Diyala killed two civilians, police Major Firaz al-Dulaimi said.

In the capital Baghdad, a magnetic "sticky bomb" attached to a car killed one person and wounded four in Wathaq Square in the city centre, an interior ministry official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

earlier related report
Iraqi MPs salvage power-sharing pact after walk-out
Baghdad (AFP) Nov 13, 2010 - Iraqi lawmakers appeared on Saturday to have salvaged a power-sharing deal that gives Nuri al-Maliki a second term as premier, days after a dramatic walk-out from parliament by his former rivals.

The pact, which has looked fragile since being signed on Wednesday, has been lauded by world leaders, including US President Barack Obama, as a step forward in a country without a new government since elections in March.

Leaders from the three main parties to the pact met before a session of parliament on Saturday and agreed to reconcile their differences and address the protests of the Sunni-backed bloc led by former premier Iyad Allawi.

MPs passed the deal by consensus, a parliamentary official told AFP, and an Iraqiya member read a statement to the Council of Representatives explaining why around 60 lawmakers from his bloc had walked out.

"We left because of a misunderstanding over the implementation of the agreement," Haidar al-Mullah, an Iraqiya MP said in a statement to the chamber.

The official, speaking on condition of anonymity, added that "around 250 MPs (of 325 members) who were present approved by consensus the power-sharing initiative."

It was not immediately clear why 75 MPs stayed away from the session, or whom they represent.

Mullah said later that three senior Iraqiya members who were barred from standing in the March elections over their alleged ties to ex-dictator Saddam Hussein's Baath party would be reinstated within 10 days.

Parliament's failure to do so on Thursday prompted the walk-out.

The next session of the Council of Representatives is scheduled for November 21, with the prolonged break due to next week's Eid al-Adha holiday.

The power-sharing deal called for Maliki, a Shiite, and President Jalal Talabani, a Kurd, to keep their jobs and for a Sunni Arab to be selected speaker of parliament.

It also established a new statutory body to oversee security as a sop to Allawi, who had held out for months to regain the post of premier.

The support of Allawi's Iraqiya bloc, which narrowly won the March 7 poll and garnered most of its seats in Sunni areas, is widely seen as vital to preventing a resurgence of inter-confessional violence.

The Sunni Arab minority that dominated Saddam Hussein's regime was the bedrock of the anti-US insurgency after the 2003 invasion.

Thursday's parliamentary session, only the second since the election, had got off to a good start, with Maliki and Allawi sitting side-by-side in the chamber.

But shortly after Sunni Arab and Iraqiya member Osama al-Nujaifi was chosen as speaker, verbal clashes erupted, with Iraqiya complaining that the deal was not being honoured.

Iraqiya had wanted the three barred members to be reinstated before the vote to elect the president.

When their demands were not met, around 60 lawmakers left the chamber. After some confusion, the remaining MPs began voting to re-elect Talabani.

Iraqiya has said its participation rests on four conditions: a bill forming the security body, a committee examining cases against political detainees, codifying the power-sharing deal and annulling the bans on the three Iraqiya members.

Allawi has repeatedly accused Maliki of monopolising security decisions during his first term. As far back as six months ago, US officials floated the idea of a new counterweight to the premier's office in order to break the deadlock over the top job.

US President Barack Obama hailed the agreement as a "milestone" in Iraq's history.

The government would be "representative, inclusive and reflect the will of the Iraqi people," he said, adding that Washington had long lobbied for such a "broad-based government."

The US military, which currently has fewer than 50,000 soldiers in Iraq, is due to withdraw all of its forces by the end of 2011.

Britain, a partner in the US-led invasion, called the deal a "significant step forward," a sentiment echoed by France and Iraq's northern neighbour Turkey.

UN chief Ban Ki-moon welcomed the deal but urged Iraq's leaders to "continue demonstrating the same spirit of partnership in moving swiftly to conclude the formation of a new government."

The Security Council said it "encourages Iraq's leaders to rededicate themselves to the pursuit of national reconciliation," and emphasised the importance of Iraq's stability for the region.

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