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Although representing only a minority of Iraq’s Sunni population, salafist groups have played a disproportionate role in the anti-American resistance and have been responsible for sparking a sectarian war in the country. NASR SALEM discusses the outlook, aims and objectives of Iraq’s salafist extremists... It was a scene that could have been taken from the annals of the Taliban’s Afghanistan. On October 18 scores of al-Qa’ida-affiliated gunmen on October 18 staged a boisterous parade in the streets of Ramadi, the capital of Iraq’s restless western Anbar province, to celebrate the declaration of an Islamic state that claims to govern Iraq’s predominantly Sunni Arab areas in central and western Iraq, rather than serving as a single, all-encompassing political community and government for the citizens of Iraq. The black-clad gunmen also raised placards vowing to continue to fight the US occupiers and the current Iraqi government. Similar parades were also reported in some towns in the...