Associated Press-Is this what “democracy” looks like?
“They increased twofold after Samarra,” said 1st Lt. Brian Murphy of Eastchester, N.Y., assigned to the 8th Squadron, 10th Cavalry Regiment, 4th Infantry Division. “They’re everywhere, in Shiite neighborhoods, Sunni ones.”
Some of the barriers are sophisticated, built in curved “serpentine” shapes that allow traffic to pass at a reduced speed. Residents said this would allow them to fire back at roaming militants trying to gun down pedestrians.
Gunmen “would be surrounded if they did anything. We would be happy if we could have more” road barriers, said Sheik Nassar Khazal, a neighborhood leader in a cluster of apartment buildings in the religiously mixed neighborhood of Dora in south Baghdad.
As he spoke, two neighborhood guards dressed in black quietly watched a passing U.S. patrol. U.S. soldiers have received reports that some of the guards are Shiite militiamen led by radical anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, whom Sunni leaders accuse of instigating much of the sectarian violence.
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