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The speaker of Iraq's fragmented Parliament threatened Tuesday to disband the legislature, saying it was so riddled with distrust it appeared unable to adopt the budget or agree on a law setting a date for provincial polls. The speaker's threat came as a large, joint US-Iraqi force began its high profile campaign against Sunni Islamists holed up in the northern city of  Mosul.

Speaker Mahmoud al-Mashhadani, a member of the minority Sunni faction, said the Iraqi Treasury had already lost $3 billion by failing to pass the budget before the end of 2007.

He did not explain how the money would have been lost but blamed Kurdish politicians who have refused to back down from a demand that their regional and semiautonomous government be guaranteed 17 percent of national income.

Iraq's Constitution allows Mashhadani to dissolve Parliament if a third of its members request the move and a majority of lawmakers approve.

Mashhadani said he already had sufficient backing for the move from five political blocs, but he refused to identify them.

Disbanding Parliament would further undermine  Premier Nuri al-Maliki's shaky government, which is currently limping along with nearly half of the 40 government departments without ministers.

Both situations fundamentally undermine the outcome of the US troop "surge" which was undertaken to bring down violence enough to allow the government and Parliament to focus on measures to reconcile differences among minority Sunnis and Kurds and the majority Shiites.

Violence has decreased but but political progress languishes.

Shiite lawmakers walked out of the rare night session Tuesday when the Kurds refused to drop their demand to lump the budget vote together with two other contested measures.

The Kurds said they feared being double-crossed on the budget, which now calls for restoration of the 17-percent Kurdish share, if parliamentarians voted on the laws separately.

"We believe the crisis of trust continues to grow and will affect the work of the government. We have to admit now that the political process has failed and call for the dissolution of Parliament and early elections," Sadrist lawmaker Bahaa al-Araji said after the fractious session.

The Tuesday night session was adjourned acrimoniously and lawmakers were to meet again on Wednesday.

Meanwhile, more than 1,000 US and Iraqi forces have begun operations against Al-Qaeda in Iraq's northern city of Mosul, the US military said Monday, paving the way for what Iraqi officials say will be a decisive strike.

Tens of thousands of US and Iraqi soldiers are taking part in several offensives in Iraq's northern provinces, where Al-Qaeda and other insurgents regrouped after being ousted from Western Anbar Province and around Baghdad last year.

Extra Iraqi troops, backed by helicopters and tanks, have been sent to Mosul. The US military said Monday an operation had begun to clear insurgents out of bases in the east of the city, where five US soldiers were killed last month.

"As of right now there are 1,000 plus ISF [Iraqi Security Forces] and CF [Coalition Forces] conducting [the] ... operation," said Major Gary Dangerfield, a spokesman for US forces in the area.

While Iraqi officials have spoken of "cleansing" Mosul of Al-Qaeda fighters, US commanders have been less emphatic, saying the forthcoming offensive was part of wider operations.

Separately, 13 bodies were found Tuesday in a mass grave in Iraq's restive Diyala Province, police said. - Agencies