BAGHDAD, March 8: Iraq's Governing Council signed an interim constitution on Monday after weeks of wrangling, in a key step towards a planned handover of sovereignty by US-led occupying powers to Iraqis on June 30.

The signing took place at a hastily arranged ceremony in Baghdad after Shia members of the 25-member council persuaded Iraq's foremost religious leader at the weekend to go along with the document despite reservations.

Just before the signing, guerillas fired mortars at a Baghdad police station, wounding three civilians and two policemen. Another missile hit a civilian house. On Sunday, insurgents fired multiple rockets at the Baghdad headquarters of the US-led administration but nobody was seriously hurt.

The signing had been delayed twice - first by bomb attacks on Shia mourning procession last Tuesday that killed at least 181 people and then by last-minute Shia reservations that forced a high-profile ceremony on Friday to be abandoned. -Reuters/AFP