THE US might be promising reconciliation in Iraq-but behind the scenes, it is playing the old imperialist game of divide-and-conquer.Its latest policy is the building of a 3.6 metre high concrete wall to enclose the Baghdad district of Adhamiya, supposedly to protect Sunni residents from Shia death-squads.

In a policy similar to Israel's occupation of Palestine, residents living in the enclosed area will be forced to enter and exit through one checkpoint.

US troops will monitor people through the use of a special ID that includes fingerprinting and eye scanning.

Ninety per cent of surveyed Adhamiya residents oppose the wall. After construction began, over 7000 locals defied a curfew to march against it.

Arkan Saeed is lives in Adhamiya. "The Americans will provoke more trouble with this," he told the BBC.

"They're telling us the wall is to protect us from the Shia militia and they're telling the Shia they're protecting them from us."

The US has planned the construction of at least ten more enclosed districts where fighting has been the most intense. It talks of opposing death-squads-and yet the main bodies responsible for the sectarian killings are either Sunni extremist groups such as Al Qaeda or US-backed Badr Brigades who have infiltrated the Iraqi police.

It aims to de-stabilise the main anti-occupation forces led by Moqtada al-Sadr by intensifying sectarian conflict, then using it as an excuse to crackdown on opposition.

By George Karavas