Arab League chief Amr Moussa called for a new Iraq as he addressed the Kurdish parliament during a landmark visit aimed at drumming up support for a national reconciliation conference.

"I hope Iraq will change, that we will see another Iraq where Iraqis from all walks of life live together in peace and love," he told MPs on Sunday at parliament, who greeted his speech with applause and a standing ovation.

The head of the 22-member Arab League arrived on Saturday to meet regional president Masud Barzani in a highly symbolic visit that marked Arab League recognition of the Kurdish autonomous region.

Moussa, on his first trip to Iraq since the US invasion of Iraq in 2003, said on Saturday he had won crucial backing from Shia spiritual leader Ali al-Sistani for his planned attempt to reconcile Iraq's divided communities.

"We have always understood the Kurdish people's ambitions," Moussa told a press conference in Arbil.

Moussa met last week the influential Sunni organisation, the Association of Muslim Scholars, and several members of the government in Baghdad.

Sadr rejected Moussa's overtures

Shia leader Muqtada al-Sadr rejected Moussa's overtures, however, continuing to insist the League clearly condemn the fighting before he would talk with the pan-Arab body, which wants to hold a preparatory conference in Cairo on 15 November ahead of full talks in Iraq.

Iraqi majority supports anti-US attacks

In London, the Sunday Telegraph published a poll that indicated that up to 65% of Iraqi citizens support attacks at US-led forces, and fewer than 1% think US-led military involvement is helping to improve security in their country.

The nationwide survey, undertaken for the Ministry of Defence, underscored for the first time the true strength of anti-Western feeling in Iraq after more than two and a half years of bloody occupation, the newspaper said.

The US military announced that four soldiers had died on Friday in various attacks, bringing the overall toll since the US-led invasion of March 2003 to 1996 according to Pentagon figures.

Suspects killed

US-led coalition forces killed 20 people suspected of links to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, during military operations on suspected safe houses near the Syrian border, the US military said.

Ten Iraqis, including seven members of the Iraqi security forces, were killed in various attacks in the country, security sources said.

An Iraqi civilian was killed and eleven others wounded in a car bomb attack aimed at a US army patrol in the northern city of Kirkuk, police sources said.

In Baghdad, Iraqi electoral officials released partial results of last week's vote on a draft constitution, while counting continued for the last five provinces.

Voters in only one province have rejected the draft charter by a potentially blocking two-thirds majority, according to the figures, but two provinces with large Sunni Arab populations, among whom opposition to the text runs high, are among those that have yet to return their results.

Under rules for the 15 October referendum, the constitution fails if it is rejected by a two-thirds majority in any three of Iraq's 18 provinces, though that still appeared unlikely.

The commission said the remaining five provinces would release their results in the next few days.

PHOTO CAPTION

Arab League Secretary-General Amr Moussa, center, speaks to media in Najaf, Iraq, Saturday, Oct. 22, 2005. (AP)