AFP - An Iraqi lawmaker predicted a meeting of political leaders on Sunday will fail to reach agreement on a new election law and that polls earmarked for January will be postponed one or two months.

"Sunday's meeting will not lead to a conclusion, chiefly because of the attitude of the Kurds," Nuredinn al-Khiyali, a Sunni MP for the Islamic Party, told AFP.

"It is a difficult subject and the elections could be delayed by one month or two," he said on Saturday.

The national security political committee is an advisory body comprising the presidential council, the prime minister, the two deputy premiers and the heads of the main political parties.

It scheduled a meeting for Sunday after the Iraqi parliament on Wednesday gave up its attempts to agree a new law to govern the general election scheduled for January.

The deadlock threatens the nationwide poll for January as the electoral law is supposed to be in place 90 days before voting.

The parliamentary impasse has triggered US concern that troops may have to stay on in numbers into next year, with a knock-on effect on redeployment options for Afghanistan.

If the committee reaches a deal on Sunday, parliament will meet again on Monday to ratify the new law.

Senior Iraqi Shiite clergy have expressed their anxiety about a possible delay in the elections.

"I want to let you know about the fears which the failure to adopt a electoral law arouses at the marjaiya (the leading Shiite Muslim clerics)," Sheikh Abdul Mahdi al-Karbalai, a representative of Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, said at Friday prayers, according to press reports on Saturday.

"The delay in the elections will create a constitutional and political void and upheaval in security. It will also block government activities... We call on political groups to be conscious of the consequences of non-publication of the electoral law," Sheikh Karbalai said.

At issue are proposed changes to the law that would require parties to publish full lists of their candidates rather than simply the name of their electoral list.

Sistani, spiritual leader of Iraq's Shiite majority, had strongly opposed moves by some MPs to retain the existing legislation.

Another major stumbling block has been the fate of the oil-rich province of Kirkuk, which the Kurds have long demanded be incorporated in their autonomous region in the north despite the opposition of its Arab and Turkmen communities.

Constitutionally, the election must be held by January 31 and it is pencilled in for January 16.

The electoral commission has said it requires 90 days to organise the polls, so the bill should have been passed by Monday.

UN special envoy Ad Melkert warned Iraqi MPs the delay in setting the ground rules for the general election -- only the second since the US-led invasion of 2003 -- threatens to undermine "the credibility of the electoral process."