Security officials opened fire on a crowd of protesters outside a government building Sunday, killing one, and al-Qaida's arm in Iraq posted a video purportedly showing an Iraqi Interior Ministry official being killed. Iraq's newly elected lawmakers, meanwhile, were expected to meet Tuesday to choose a speaker and two deputies, the National Assembly said. The lawmakers met March 16 but repeatedly have postponed a second meeting because of negotiations over Cabinet positions. It was unclear whether they would name the country's new president, expected to be Kurdish leader Jalal Talabani, on Tuesday. In a letter to the Shiite-led United Iraqi Alliance, politicians who ran under a coalition formed by interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi, a secular Shiite, warned against allowing religion to play a greater role in Iraq's government, saying it could "lead to instability in the relations between political forces in the Iraqi arena."Some have worried that the Shiite dominance of the National Assembly could lead to the establishment of Islamic rule, although Shiite leaders have repeatedly denied that and promised to form an inclusive government that includes Kurds and Sunni Arabs in top Cabinet posts. Influential Shiite cleric Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani met with the top U.N. envoy in Iraq, Ashraf Qazi, on Sunday in Najaf, telling Qazi he did not intend to involve himself in politics except for expressing his opinion in times of crises.
Violence persisted Sunday, with bodyguards for Science and Technology Minister Rashad Mandan Omar firing on a crowd of protesters in front of the ministry's offices demanding their full wages, said Hamid Balasem, an engineer at the ministry. About 50 ministry guards were demonstrating, saying they had only been paid in part, Balasem said. It was unclear why the minister's bodyguards opened fire.