By Kristin Roberts WASHINGTON, Dec 15 (Reuters) - U.S. and Iraqi forces are struggling to ease sectarian tension in one of Iraq's most volatile areas where much of the population seeking security turns to terrorists, not Iraqi troops or police, a U.S. commander said on Friday. Army Col. David Sutherland, commander of forces in Iraq's Diyala province, said suspicions of corruption within the Iraqi forces increased support for terrorist groups. "Public perceptions of corruption, inequity and fear are the driving force behind support to terrorist organizations," Sutherland, speaking on a video link from Baquba, Iraq, told Pentagon reporters. The Iraqi security force is heavily Shi'ite in Diyala, which is majority Sunni and a major center of sectarian hatred in Iraq. Attacks on Shi'ites by Sunni insurgents linked to al Qaeda and reprisals by both sides have surged since the bombing of a Shi'ite shrine in Samarra in February. "Some political groups and tribal leaders are turning to terrorist and insurgent organizations for protection," Sutherland said. "This sort of unity only worsens the sectarian divide and encourages further violence."The key to security is separating the insurgents from the terrorists and bringing the insurgents into political process while defeating the terrorists with intelligence-driven operations." The Iraqi army has contributed to the tension by conducting wide sweeps in search of insurgents, detaining large groups of Shi'ites at a time. Sutherland acknowledged the impact of those sweeps and said they were being replaced by what he called intelligence-driven operations with specific targets. "Since we've been conducting operations with them, their operations are based on intelligence and are evidence-based," he said. "However, previously there were some operations that were wide-cast and that created disillusion toward the Iraqi security forces -- wide-cast operations where they would detain multiple people, rather than just those that they had evidence against." "That created a great deal of disillusion toward the security forces that were operating, so they would turn to other elements that they felt could protect them more. And those other elements happened to be terrorist organizations." Sutherland said placing more American troops within Iraqi units as advisers and trainers would boost professionalism within the force, and that discussions were under way to increase the number of embedded U.S. forces. That would be in line with the belief among senior military officials that increased training will more quickly build an Iraqi force of taking the lead. Sutherland also said the Iraqi security force was trying to recruit Sunnis in Diyala to bring the demographic make-up of the troops in line with that of the population.
