Officials in Iraq have warned it will take at least a year before a new constitution for the country can be drawn up, says the BBC.
The news will be a blow to the US, which had hoped to complete such a document within six months in order to pass control of the country over to the Iraqis.
A committee of lawyers, scholars and religious leaders set up to prepare the groundwork for a constitutional convention met recently but failed to agree on the selection of delegates for the convention.
Another issue is whether those asked to draft the new constitution should be elected or selected, since elections would involve a census and voter registration lists. Other issues include whether the system should be presidential or parliamentary, the role of Islam in the new society, and even whether Iraq should become a federal state with autonomy for the Kurds in the north and Shia Muslims in the south.
The BBC said several Iraqi officials said the six-month timeframe US government officials had set in place had been unrealistic given the immense complexities of Iraq's religious, cultural and ethnic groups. "The fate of Iraq depends on the constitution," Dara Noor Alzin, a governing council member who works with the committee, told the Associated Press news agency.
"It is not for one or 10 years. It's for future generations. It must be carefully written."
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