For weeks, Iraqi MPs have been locked in a political crisis that has stalled progress on key decisions including one affecting their own offices in a future parliament complex.

Iraq launched an international competition in late 2011 to design a new parliament, replacing the current Saddam-era edifice, and last week, the Royal Institute of British Architects, which ran the contest to shield Baghdad from accusations of corruption, recommended a London-based group for the job.

But the chosen group Assemblage has not heard from parliament officials since being selected, and British architecture publications have said Baghdad is still in talks over a rival design by award-winning Iraqi-born architect Zaha Hadid.

"I think that they've got their hands full right now with trying to keep the parliament from being dissolved and the whole thing collapsing," Peter Besley, cofounder and director of Assemblage, told by telephone.

"I think the main concern is that there won't be a parliament to sit in this building if we build it," he added. "So we've got to give them some time. I think their in-boxes are a bit full right now."

Besley was referring to a series of interlocking political crises in Baghdad that have pitted Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki against his erstwhile government partners ahead of key provincial elections in April.

Various members of Maliki's national unity cabinet -- Sunnis, Kurds and members of his own Shiite community -- have accused him of authoritarianism and sectarianism, and he has faced weeks of protests that have hardened opposition against his rule.

The row has largely brought policy-making in Iraq to a standstill, with no landmark legislation passed since parliamentary elections in March 2010.

And now it appears the dispute has stalled decisions on plans to relocate parliament from its current location inside the capital's Green Zone to another central Baghdad location, but one outside the heavily fortified complex that is home to the cabinet as well as the American and British embassies.

Under the terms of the RIBA competition, Iraq's parliament is under no obligation to choose the project that emerged top in the contest, but with a week having passed since the winner was announced, officials in Baghdad have not even acknowledged receiving the RIBA recommendations.

Assemblage says it has received the $250,000 competition prize, and is keen to get on with more detailed designs and planning that could see construction on the new parliament begin as early as 2015.