Baghdad, Iraq ? A United Nations official said Friday that direct elections were the ideal way to pick a new Iraqi government but probably weren’t feasible by the June 30 deadline for transferring power from the U.S.-led coalition.

U.N. special envoy Lakhdar Brahimi said too many crucial steps to an election were missing and weren’t likely to be in place by the handover date.

His remarks, on behalf of a U.N. fact-finding team wrapping up its work this week, essentially called for a compromise between the coalition’s proposed caucus system for selecting members of an Iraqi national assembly and demands for direct elections by a powerful Shiite Muslim cleric, Ayatollah Ali al-Husseini al-Sistani.

Brahimi didn’t clarify what that compromise might be. American officials have said they aren’t willing to delay turning over authority to Iraqis, and al-Sistani so far has been unwilling to support any process for selecting a government that doesn’t include direct elections.

Brahimi said Iraqi leaders and coalition officials were moving toward scrapping the caucus plan, and that its proponents “realize it needs, at the very least, to be improved.” However, Brahimi said he was unsure of an alternative model.

Dan Senor, a top American spokesman in Baghdad, said Friday there would be no public reaction to the U.N. team’s visit until U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan announced the group’s final findings, expected in a week to 10 days.

The U.S-led coalition and the American-appointed Iraqi Governing Council in November set the June 30 turnover in a plan that included a system of local caucuses to select representatives to a national assembly. The caucuses would consist of local leaders and people the Governing Council nominated.