Perspective: De facto partition takes hold in Iraq as Sunni-Shiite violence rages on

BAGHDAD, Iraq: For months, brothers Majed and Mondhir Hatem Waheed steadfastly endured the killings raging around them in their mainly Sunni district, staying put as fellow Shiites packed up and left.

Finally, a death threat persuaded them to move, leaving the neighborhood of Dora where they grew up and, together with their wives and children joining 24 relatives in an uncle's house in Baghdad's Shiite Sadr city district.

"At least, we are safe," 25-year-old Mondhir Hatem Waheed said.

In the 43 months since Saddam Hussein's ouster, entire Iraqi provinces have become virtual no-go areas for one or another sect, mixed Sunni-Shiite neighborhoods are slowly disappearing and a Kurdish region in the north appears to have all but seceded.

In many ways, Iraq already is breaking up, though not in a way in which a well-defined boundary could be established to ensure peace. And this is happening amid a debate on whether partitioning this ethnically and religiously diverse nation could provide a way out of the growing sectarian violence tearing it apart.

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