Two figures at the centre of drawn-out efforts to form a new Iraqi government, former premier Iyad Allawi and radical Shiite cleric Moqtada Sadr, met in Syria's capital on Monday.

President Bashar al-Assad also held talks with Allawi, who has been embroiled in months of haggling to reach a deal on a new coalition government in Baghdad, two days after the Syrian leader met separately with Sadr.

Allawi told a press conference in a Damascus hotel that he and Sadr had agreed on "the need to speed up the formation of a government that would group all the political movements and have a clear programme."

Separately, Sadr told reporters that Allawi's bloc was "ready to make concessions to put an end to Iraq's political crisis," and urged other parties to do the same "for the sake of the Iraqi public interest."

Neighbouring countries are welcome "to give advice" but "without interfering in Iraqi affairs," he said.

In his talks with Allawi, Assad reiterated "Syria's support for any inter-Iraqi accord (on a government) which conserves the unity of Iraq, its Arab identity and its sovereignty," Syria's official news agency SANA reported.

Allawi, who is vying for the post of prime minister with the incumbent, Nuri al-Maliki, in turn thanked Syria for playing host to hundreds of thousands of Iraqi refugees and its support for efforts to restore stability in Iraq.

Efforts to form a new government, more than four months after a March 7 election in Iraq, also figured in talks in Damascus last Saturday between Assad and Sadr.

The bloc of anti-US cleric Sadr, who lives in self-imposed exile in Iran, gained 39 seats in Iraq's new 325-strong parliament, against 91 for Allawi and 89 for Maliki -- both also Shiites.

On Monday, Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu flew in to Damascus and held talks with Assad, agreeing on the need "to speed up the formation of a government" in Iraq, their two countries' common neighbour, SANA said.

Briton killed in north Iraq attack: embassy
Baghdad (AFP) July 19, 2010 - A Briton was killed in an attack on a private security firm's convoy in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul on Monday, British government officials said.

"One British national was killed today during an attack against a convoy in east Mosul," British embassy spokeswoman Sophie Farrell told AFP, without identifying the victim. Farrell said no other Briton was hurt.

Britain's Foreign Office confirmed the death, saying the attack was on a private security convoy.

"A British national was killed in an attack on a British private security company convoy in Mosul this morning. We have offered consular assistance," a Foreign Office spokesman said.

There was no immediate confirmation from the Iraqi side.

But police in Mosul said five people were wounded in the morning in a car bomb attack that targeted a foreign security firm in the city, without providing further details.

Mosul is Iraq's second largest city and the capital of volatile Nineveh province.

Britain provided the second-largest contingent of troops to the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, with a deployment which peaked at 46,000.

It ended combat operations in Iraq in April 2009, when all but a handful of British soldiers started returning home. Some 100 military are still deployed in the southern port of Umm Qasr where they train the Iraqi navy.

In other attacks on Monday, a bomb in a car parked in front of a coffee shop killed seven people and wounded 21 in Baquba, 60 kilometres (35 miles) north of Baghdad, according to police.

A member of the Sahwa (Awakening) militia was killed and three wounded by a sticky bomb on their car in the centre of Fallujah, 60 kilometres (35 miles) west of Baghdad, police said.

That attack came a day after 45 Sahwa members were killed in a suicide bombing in Radwaniyah, also in western Iraq, as they queued to receive their pay.

In Baghdad, a roadside bomb targeted the convoy of Iraq's deputy agriculture minister, Mehdi Dhamad, the interior ministry said. Dhamad escaped unharmed but five people, including a bodyguard, were wounded.

And a man was shot dead in front of his home in Kirkuk, 240 kilometres (150 miles) north of the capital, local police said.