BERLIN, Oct. 9 (Xinhuanet) -- Leaders of German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder's Social Democratic Party (SPD) and Angela Merkel's Christian Democratic Union (CDU) are set to meet on Monday to discuss ways to break the impasse of the chancellorship issue, officials said Sunday.

    They are also scheduled to meet on Sunday night but no decisionor statement is to be announced.

    Their impending meeting on Monday, the third of the kind, will follow meetings of both parties' executives.

    Local media reported over the weekend that Schroeder appeared to be near agreeing to step aside to make way for Merkel to become Germany's first woman chancellor.

    In return, the CDU has agreed to give half of all cabinet poststo the SPD.

    Before the new round of talks, the SPD searched its ranks for acandidate to take the post of vice chancellor and possibly that offoreign minister in the new government.

    Matthias Platzeck, popular SPD premier of Brandenburg, turned down a request from party leaders that he take the post of vice chancellor, which is likely the SPD standard bearer in the new government.

    He told Berlin's daily Tagesspiegel on Sunday that he had promised the Brandenburg voters to stay on his post after winning reelection in a recent state election.

    German news agency DPA reported that powerful SPD members, suchas Interior Minister Otto Schily, have argued for Schroeder to remain in the post of chancellor for another two years and then hand it to Merkel.

    The two parties have been engaging for a grand coalition as both camps failed to achieve majority in the Sept. 18 elections.

    Leaders of the two parties met for their first meeting Thursdayevening to handle the stinging chancellor impasse that is blocking the proceedings of a grand coalition between the SPD and CDU.

    The Sunday and Monday meetings will be attended by Schroeder, SPD Chairman Franz Muentefering, Merkel and Edmund Stoiber, leader of CDU's Bavaria-based sister party Christian Social Union (CSU).

    The two sides edged closer on key issues such as the labor market reform, social welfare system and public finances.

    The German political crisis resulted from the Sept. 18 elections, in which neither the SPD-Green coalition nor the CDU/CSU-FDP alliance won a majority.

    The CDU/CSU seized 226 seats in the Bundestag, four more than that of the SPD.

    After attempts to join hands with smaller parties failed, the SPD and CDU/CSU have sought to forge a grand coalition government,which was once seen between 1966 and 1969. Enditem