BAGHDAD, Iraq – Iraq’s main Sunni Arab group made an unprecedented trip north to see the Kurds and agreed yesterday for the first time on broad outlines for a coalition government – possibly opening a way out of the political turmoil that has gripped the country since disputed elections.

A promise of Iraqi army protection for tanker truck drivers reopened the country’s main refinery – a last-ditch effort by the Shiite-led government to avert a fuel crisis that has led to deadly riots and the oil minister’s resignation.

The violence that followed the December 15 parliamentary elections was unabated. A suicide car bomber targeted a busload of police recruits north of Baghdad, killing seven people, and gunmen in the capital killed five workers.

As part of the bargaining for a new coalition government, President Talabani assured Prime Minister al-Jaafari that his fellow Kurds would not object if the Shiite religious bloc that won the most votes in the election, the United Iraqi Alliance, again nominates him for the post.

But it was the agreement struck yesterday by Kurdistan’s regional president, Massoud Barzani, and representatives of the main Sunni Arab Iraqi Accordance Front that opened the way for a new broad-based government. It also drew the ire of minority parties and secular groups.

“They will be part of a future government,” a Kurd who sat in on the meetings, Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari, said.

Sunni Arabs and secular parties, such as the one headed by a Shiite former prime minister, Ayad Allawi, have complained the elections were tainted by fraud and intimidation. They have demanded a new vote in some provinces, including Baghdad.

With the agreement, the Accordance Front seems to have broken a pact to only discuss those complaints during their meetings with the Kurds. Opposition groups are waiting for a team of international monitors – which came to Baghdad yesterday – to assess the elections and examine the complaints, which number about 1,500.The United Nations has called the vote credible.

Final results are expected as early as this week, and the Shiite religious bloc may win about 130 seats – short of the 184 seats needed to avoid a coalition with other parties to elect a president. That election is a prerequisite before a government can be formed.

The Kurds could get about 55 seats, the main Sunni Arab groups about 50 and Mr. Allawi secular’s bloc could receive about 25.