Shia keep down Sunnis in post-U.S. Iraq

BAGHDAD -- Now that U.S. forces are gone, Iraq's ruling Shia are moving quickly to keep the two Muslim sects separate -- and unequal.

Sunnis are locked out of key jobs at universities and in government, their leaders banned from cabinet meetings or even marked as fugitives. Sunnis cannot get help finding the body of loved ones killed in the war. And Shia banners are everywhere in Baghdad.

With the Americans no longer here to play peacemaker and Sunni-ruled Gulf Arab nations moving to isolate Iraq, it's a development that could lead to an effective breakup of the country.

"The sectarian war has moved away from violence to a soft conflict fought in the state institutions, government ministries and on the street," said political analyst Hadi Jalo. "What was once an armed conflict has turned into territorial, institutionalized and psychological segregation."

Despite occasional large-scale bombings, March recorded the lowest monthly toll for violent deaths since the 2003 U.S.-invasion.

A total of 112 Iraqis were killed last month, compared with 122 in November 2009, the previous lowest.

Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, a Shia hard-liner in office for nearly six years, does not tire of telling anyone who cares to listen that it was he who defeated "terrorism," the word he uses to refer to the Sunni insurgency.

Critics charge that al-Maliki is suspicious of all Sunnis, even those who never joined the insurgency or abandoned it later, and is punishing a community that lost its protectors when the Americans left Iraq in December, ending eight years of occupation.

Yesterday, President Barack Obama called al-Maliki to express Washington's "firm commitment to a unified, democratic Iraq as defined by Iraq's constitution."

A White House statement also said that Obama stated his support for the prime minister's participation in a national dialogue hosted by President Jalal Talabani to reconcile Iraqi political blocs. The dialogue formally opens Thursday.

Al-Maliki has denied allegations that his government is harassing or discriminating against Sunnis. He even bragged to Arab leaders gathered for a summit meeting in Baghdad last week that "it is not an exaggeration to say that our success in national reconciliation can be an example to follow in Arab nations suffering from acts of violence and conflict."

But Vice President Tareq al-Hashemi, the administration's top Sunni official, is a fugitive wanted by prosecutors on terror charges. He fled to the self-ruled Kurdish region in northern Iraq to escape what he said would certainly be a politically motivated trial and left this week for Qatar, which has publicly criticized what the Gulf nation's prime minister called the marginalization of Sunnis.

Ordinary Sunnis complain of discrimination in almost all aspects of life, including housing, education, employment and security.

Formerly mixed neighborhoods of Baghdad, such as Hurriyah, are now predominantly Shia and protected by concrete barrier walls and checkpoints; with Shia militias effectively policing many areas, hardly any Sunnis dare to return.