The planned elections, which will cover most of the country, will hand more power to regions and weaken the control of the Shiite-led government on matters such as police forces and economic development.

Balloting has been delayed repeatedly by bickering in parliament, mostly over Kurdish objections to how provincial council seats would be allocated in the oil-rich Kirkuk region in northern Iraq.

Kurds want the government to follow through with a promised referendum in Kirkuk to decide whether it should join the semi-autonomous Kurdish region or remain under Baghdad.

Another attempt to pass an election law and clear the way for the voting could come this week.

More encouraging for Sunnis was the government's announcement Sunday that an oil refinery in an area of western Iraq once controlled by Sunni insurgents has resumed production.

The refinery, located near the Syrian border in the once-violent Anbar Province, was closed in 2005 due to deteriorating security. Its rehabilitation is part of efforts by the Shiite-led government to boost services and win loyalties in the nation's Sunni heartland.

The refinery is expected to generate local jobs and meet needs for fuel and other petroleum products in the region, which was once the main stronghold of al-Qaida in Iraq.

Armed Anbar groups began an uprising against al-Qaida last year to halt attacks that claimed hundreds of civilian lives. The Anbar movement was hailed by the U.S. military as vital to helping root out insurgents - a key element in bringing violence in Iraq to its lowest level in four years.

Washington and Iraqi leaders now want to deepen Anbar's support with political pacts and development projects such as the refinery, which began work on Friday.

The 51-year-old refinery will have an initial capacity of processing 16,000 barrels of crude a day, said a statement from the Oil Ministry. Two more production units will be added to reach 70,000 barrels a day, the statement added without mentioning a specific timetable.

Iraq's three main oil refineries are running at roughly half the 700,000 barrels daily capacity before the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003.

In 2006, the ministry built another refinery in the Shiite holy city of Najaf, about 100 miles south of Baghdad. It has a refining capacity of about 20,000 barrels per day.

At least two other refinery construction deals are being negotiated.

Iraq has the world's third-largest known crude oil reserves - an estimated 115 billion barrels - but it suffers acute refinery shortages following years of U.N. sanctions and war.

Separately, in the country's south, a new airport opened in Najaf in what the prime minister said was a key step in the reconstruction of a country devastated by war.

Hundreds of thousands of pilgrims, mostly Iranians, travel to Iraq every year to visit Shiite shrines in Najaf and another holy city, Karbala. The new airport is expected to boost the numbers of pious tourists.

At a ceremony, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki described the $250 million airport as a vital element in Iraq's economic development. A military airfield was renovated for the new airport, and several flights were expected to land on Sunday.

"We were determined to face the terrorism that was about to destroy Iraq. The strong will of the federal government has fought and defeated it in all of its forms," al-Maliki said.

Separately, the U.S. military said, American soldiers killed two armed relatives of a provincial governor during a raid in Salahuddin provice against al-Qaida in Iraq.

The military says in a statement that the soldiers were acting in self-defense when they shot the relatives of Hamad Hammoud, governor of Salahuddin province. It says the slain men showed "hostile intent."

The raid happened Sunday in Beiji in northern Iraq. The deputy governor, Abdullah Hussein Jabarah, says the slain men were the son and nephew of the governor. The U.S. military said a financier for al-Qaida in Iraq was wounded and captured.

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