US troops are building a wall around a Sunni enclave in Baghdad as part of a strategy to tackle sectarian violence in the Iraqi capital.
Work began on April 10th on the five kilometre cement wall at Adhamiya, a mainly Sunni Arab area surrounded on three sides by Shia communities.
"The wall is one of the centrepieces of a new strategy by coalition and Iraqi forces to break the cycle of sectarian violence," a US military spokesman said.
US officials said the wall was not intended to divide the capital into separate communities as part of a two-month-old security crackdown.
While protecting Sunni Arabs who live in Adhamiya from attack by Shia militias, the wall would also stop Sunni militants launching attacks in Shia areas and then retreating back into Adhamiya, the US military said.
Traffic control points manned by Iraqi soldiers will be the only way in and out of Adhamiya once the wall was finished.
US and Iraqi forces have poured thousands of extra troops into the capital to enforce a plan seen as a final attempt to bring Iraq back from the brink of all-out sectarian civil war.
But senior military officials said the crackdown would not include dividing the capital into Sunni Arab and Shia areas.