Iraqi residents carry the coffin of one of the 24 civilians who were dragged at a checkpoint and shot "execution style" in Udhaim, 120 km (80 miles) north of Baghdad, June 4, 2006. [Reuters]

A hard-line Sunni organization in Basra, the influential Sunni Arab Association of Muslim Scholars, said the nine people killed had come to the mosque to protect it.

Parliament was postponed Sunday after al-Maliki again failed to find agreement on who should run Iraq's security forces. The Shiite prime minister had promised to present candidates for the defense and interior posts, as well as minister of state for national security, on Sunday for approval by the 275-member parliament.

The political parties decided "to give the prime minister another chance to have more negotiations," said Deputy Parliament Speaker Khalid al-Atiya, a Shiite.

In Washington, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice expressed confidence that Iraqi leaders would agree on candidates in the next few days.

"Of course, they need to get this settled, but they will get it settled. I really do believe that they'll get it settled in the next few days. But the important thing here is that they get it right," she told Fox News on Sunday.

The Interior Ministry will go to a Shiite, the Defense to a Sunni Arab, in an effort to provide balance on security matters. Much of the problems focused on Shiite objections to some Sunni Arab candidates for the defense ministry because they served in the military under ousted President Saddam Hussein.

"The names which were presented for the Defense Ministry were all rejected because some of them are famous military officers during the Saddam era," said Haider al-Ebadi, a Shiite legislator and senior official from al-Maliki's Dawa party.

There also was dissent in Shiite ranks over the interior ministry.

Iraqi security forces were searching Baghdad for four Russian diplomats kidnapped Saturday. Another Russian diplomat was killed in the attack that took place near the embassy in west Baghdad's Mansour district. US Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad condemned the attack and promised to help seek the release of the hostages.

The US military said an American soldier was killed Saturday in the volatile Anbar province.

In other violence Sunday, according to police:

- Gunmen in a car opened fire on a minibus carrying telecommunications workers to an area near the Shiite slum of Sadr City, killing four and wounding two.

- Police found 16 bullet-riddled bodies in Baghdad and four in the city of Tikrit, north of the capital.

- Gunmen in Tikrit killed three police officers and wounded two others at a checkpoint.

- Gunmen broke into the home of an Iraqi army soldier, killing him, his two brothers and father and wounding his mother.

- Two gunmen on a motorcycle killed Muntaha Ali and her husband Helmi Yaseen in Basra, believed to be employees of a US government agency.