Shiites remain undecided over prime minister

The speaker said he would call parliament into session Monday.
BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) -- Key Shiite politicians cast doubt Wednesday on a plan to convene parliament next week, saying they still have not decided whether to replace their candidate for prime minister to break a deadlock over forming a new government.
Four more American soldiers were killed in Iraq, the U.S. military said as the U.S. death toll for the month surpassed the total for all of March. More than 40 Iraqis also died, including at least 22 in a car bombing near a Shiite mosque northeast of Baghdad.
Parliament Speaker Adnan Pachachi, a Sunni Arab, said at a nationally televised press conference that he would call parliament into session Monday to push forward efforts to form a new government, which have been snarled for weeks over who will serve as prime minister.
Here's the situation
Iraqi voters chose the 275-member assembly Dec. 15, but the legislature met briefly only once last month because the country's ethnically and religiously based parties have not agreed on a new government of national unity.
Talks stalled after Sunnis and Kurds refused to accept the Shiite nominee, Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari, to head the new government, which must be approved by parliament.
U.S. officials have been urging the Iraqis to speed up talks on the new government to confront the violence sweeping the country. Tensions between Shiites and Sunni Arabs have risen since the Feb. 22 bombing of a Shiite shrine in Samarra triggered a wave of reprisal attacks.
Meanwhile, the trial of Saddam Hussein adjourned after only five minutes Wednesday when handwriting experts scheduled to testify failed to appear.
Chief Judge Raouf Abdel-Rahman lectured prosecutors for not ensuring the experts were on hand and set a new session for Monday.
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