BAGHDAD, August 8, 2005 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) - A massive sandstorm Monday, August 8, derailed a crucial meeting of Iraqi leaders called to break the constitutional deadlock with just a week left to meet a deadline on writing the new charter.

The sandstorm coated Baghdad in a cloak of orange dust from early Monday leaving thousands of inhabitants suffocating and forcing others to stay indoors.

Traffic came to a virtual standstill, while those who dared step out wore masks or covered their mouths with cloth to keep the dust out.

The capital's main airport was also shut with no flights taking off.

The storm derailed crucial constitutional negotiations due to be held at President Jalal Talabani's residence, with many leaders unable to travel, including Kurdish leader Massud Barzani whose helicopter was grounded in the north

"Following consultations with President Jalal Talabani and others, it was decided to postpone the meeting from Monday to Tuesday because of the bad weather conditions," a presidential statement said, according to Agence France-Presse (AFP).

"The meetings will resume on August 9 and continue over the following days in order to reach a consensus on the constitution, before forwarding it to parliament on August 15," it said.

Talabani was supposed to host the second day of talks between Iraqis from across the sectarian and ethnic divide to try to break the current deadlock.

Not all leaders attended Sunday's meeting though.

Barzani was unable to fly from the northern Kurdish region to the capital because of the sand storm which by Monday morning had reduced visibility to a few yards (meters).

And Prime Minister Ibrahim Jaafari did not attend because of "security concerns" over his venturing a couple of miles (kilometres) from the fortified Green Zone that houses the government to the president's home, Goradaghi added.

Leaders have, however, agreed "to hold daily meetings until all points of disagreement are settled by consensus," the spokesman said, adding that they fully intended meeting the August 15 deadline.

"If they agree on the principle of reaching decisions by consensus it implies they are each ready to make concessions," he added.

Sunday evening "participants just put forward their respective points of view, but there was no time to get into details," the spokesman added.

Two Iraqis watch as protestors run from police during Samawa riots. (Reuters)

According to legislators, at least 18 key items remain to be settled, including women's rights, the country's official languages and the future of the oil-rich northern city of Kirkuk.

"We are in a race against the clock," Mahmud Othman, a member of the constitutional drafting committee, told AFP, adding that there was "great US and British pressure" to meet the August 15 dateline.

Talabani suggested there was no problem with the issue of federalism in the north, where his fellow Kurds have enjoyed a de facto state under US military protection since 1991, Reuters reported.

But he said calls for federalism in the Shiite south, home to the country's biggest oil reserves, were a matter for dispute.

Some prominent secular Shiites, including Deputy Prime Minister Ahmad Chalabi, a powerful figure in the oil sector, are pushing for it.

Many Kurds further fear giving up hard-won ground and settling for something less than they have after the drafting of the constitution.

The Kurds carved three semi-independent provinces out of northern Iraq after the 1991 Gulf War, sealing it off from the rest of the country under cover of a no-fly zone enforced on Saddam Hussein's air force by US and British warplanes.

Kurdish leader Massoud Barzani rejected Sunday an Islamic and Arabic identity for Iraq under the new constitution.

Shiite leader Abdel Aziz Hakim, who attended Sunday’s meeting, said in an interview with state-owned Iraqiya television that he was optimistic differences would be resolved.

"There are some points of disagreement and we still have some talking to do, but I am optimistic at the possibility of a consensus," Hakim said.

Efforts to break an impasse on the constitution came a day after widespread frustrations with poor government services erupted into violence Sunday in the southern city of Samawa, Reuters reported.

Hundreds of people took to the streets and burned cars to protest power, water and sewage problems and police opened fire on the crowd, killing one person and wounding about 40, police in the mainly Shiite city said.

Shiites, who hoped for a brighter future after Saddam Hussein's fall and the emergence of a Shiite-led government in January elections, are still locked in a daily grind.

The protests were called by the local council, which is dominated by Samawa's town elders, not Shiite parties.