IRAQI leaders appear ready to take a high-risk gamble today, betting that they can complete their constitution by a mid-August deadline despite huge outstanding differences between Shia and Kurdish MPs.

MPs have until this morning to submit a request for an extension to the August 15 deadline for finishing the document, which will govern fresh elections in December. But many insisted yesterday that the charter could not be completed within such a tight schedule.

If they fail to meet the deadline, the national assembly will be dissolved, plunging the country into another leadership crisis and shattering the remaining hopes of disillusioned Iraqis about their new government.

The huge strain on MPs was evident in parliament as the main factions scuttled a packed session to confer in lobbies, with some predicting a delay even as others insisted that none would be asked for. “It’s a disaster, not a crisis,” said Hussein al-Adhab, deputy head of the constitutional sub-committee on legal issues, who said that MPs would ask for one month of the six-month extension allowed for by law.

After months of bargaining, the constitutional committee has yet to resolve key issues such as whether Islam will be the main source of legislation, a motion backed by the religious Shia majority, whether Iraq will have an Arab identity — a move opposed by the Kurds — and the issues of women’s rights and how much autonomy should be granted under the federal system.

Hassan Senid, a member of the Shia block, said that a key sticking point was a Kurdish demand for autonomous regions such as theirs to retain control of 65 per cent of their local oil wealth, giving only 35 per cent to the central government. “This will create very rich regions next to very poor ones,” he said, adding that Sunni areas, where the insurgency is concentrated, would receive almost no oil revenue.

Adding to the federal dilemma, Faraj al-Haidar, of the Kurdish Democratic Party (KDP), said that the Kurds insisted on a clause allowing the Kurdish north to hold a referendum on secession in eight years. He said that the Kurds also wanted the opt-out clause to apply if other political blocks tried to manipulate agreements. “We don’t trust them,” he said. “It’s a crisis of trust.”

As the deadline loomed last night, officials said that a possible compromise could be to accept the deadline but ask for a 15-day extension to clear up any outstanding issues.

Several MPs admitted that Washington — which has insisted that there be no delay so as to not derail the shaky political process — had been leaning on them to push ahead. Donald Rumsfeld, the US Defence Secretary, bluntly told MPs to “get on with it” during a brief visit last week. And Jalal Talabani, the Iraqi President, insisted yesterday that the August 15 deadline would be met after a meeting with Zalmay Khalilzad, the US ambassador to Iraq.

As MPs struggled to thrash out a series of compromises, gunmen attacked the convoy of Ahmed Chalabi, the deputy prime minister, to the south of the capital. One of his bodyguards was killed in the attack, but Mr Chalabi was not in the motorcade at the time.

In Baghdad, five American soldiers were killed in two separate bombings, and in the Sunni Triangle US Marines used tanks and airstrikes to destroy a heavily fortified guerrilla position in a village schoolhouse, killing 11 insurgents.

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