Iraq's Prime Minister-designate Ibrahim al-Jaafari is trying to fill several cabinet positions ahead of Tuesday's expected swearing-in of the country's new government.
Officials say Mr. al-Jaafari is still seeking a Sunni to take the key post of defense minister. But they say the swearing-in will go ahead even if there are a few temporary cabinet appointments.
Meanwhile, the U.S. military says it has found the body of one pilot of a Marine F-18 jet that crashed in Iraq Monday, but a second jet is still missing.
The military says there were no indications that the planes had come under hostile fire and that it was still not clear if the two planes had collided.
In a separate statement, the U.S. military said coalition forces killed 12 suspected insurgents in a firefight Monday in a small town near the Syrian border. It said six soldiers and a six-year-old girl were wounded in the fight against suspected militants linked to terrorist mastermind Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.
Some information for this report provided by Reuters, AP and AFP.
