BAGHDAD, Nov 29 (Reuters) - Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al- Maliki meets U.S. President George W. Bush on Wednesday. Following are the main communities and factions in Iraq: SHI'ITES About 60 percent of Iraq's 26 million people, Arab Shi'ites follow the minority branch of Islam, dating from a 7th-century schism and dominant also in non-Arab Iran. Most voted for the United Alliance, grouping Islamist parties, and which has a near majority in the parliament elected in December. Its sponsor is Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, an ageing and reclusive senior cleric whose calls for restraint militants ignore. Alliance parties are vying for power in the oil-rich south. They include: -- SCIRI: The Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq was founded in Iran in 1982. Its Badr Brigade armed wing fought with Iran against Saddam Hussein. SCIRI leader Abdul Aziz al-Hakim has proposed creating an autonomous region uniting the mainly Shi'ite south. The Badr movement is believed to have many members in Iraq's police. It denies conducting assassinations. -- Moqtada al-SADR: A firebrand preacher in his early 30s, Sadr derives his power from his clerical lineage and a welfare network modeled on Lebanon's Hezbollah. His Mehdi Army is blamed by Sunnis for many death squad killings. Sadr has called for restraint and some question his grip on his militia. -- DAWA: Founded in 1957, it was a leading underground opposition force to Saddam. It also has a militia. Leading members include Maliki and his predecessor Ibrahim al-Jaafari. SUNNI ARABS Sunni Arabs, who share their faith with the rulers of most Arab states, are commonly estimated to be about a fifth of the population. They were dominant under Ottoman and British rule, and under Saddam. They tend to live in the northwest and Baghdad, where oil is scarce. These are the important groups: -- INSURGENTS: Rejecting the U.S. occupation and Shi'ite domination, many Sunnis took no part in the political process. A loose alliance of nationalist followers of Saddam's Baath party and foreign-inspired Islamists who look to al Qaeda attack U.S. troops, government forces and Sunnis involved in politics. -- ACCORDANCE FRONT: Dropping a boycott of the January 2005 election, the Islamic Party and others ran as the Accordance Front and secured a fifth of the seats in December. Key figures include parliamentary leader Adnan al-Dulaimi and Vice President Tareq al-Hashemi. They denounce violence but say Sunnis are oppressed by Shi'ite-dominated security forces and need constitutional amendments to guarantee a share of oil wealth. -- MUSLIM CLERICS ASSOCIATION: The main Sunni clerical body justifies armed resistance against occupying forces but not the killing of civilians. Its leader, Harith al-Dari, is in exile in Jordan and wanted on suspicion of terrorism by Iraq. KURDS About a fifth of the population, most ethnic Kurds live in the northern mountains. Long set on independence, leaders say they will now be content with the sweeping autonomy secured from Saddam with U.S. help in 1991. Since a war in the 1990s between two big secular parties, mainly Sunni Kurdistan has prospered and is reunited. Arabs accuse Kurdish peshmerga militias of driving them from Kirkuk, the oil centre Kurds want for their capital after a local referendum due in 2007. Main parties are: -- KDP: Kurdistan Democratic Party leader Masoud Barzani is president of the Kurdistan region, based in Arbil. -- PUK: Patriotic Union of Kurdistan leader Jalal Talabani, long based in Sulaimaniya, is president of Iraq.
