marginalizing and discriminating against the Sunnis. And in the early years, Washington did almost nothing to restrain them. The civil war that nearly tore Iraq apart in 2006 and 2007 has receded, but the resentments have not. In recent weeks, Sunni extremists have begun a new campaign of bloody attacks on Shiite mosques and civilians, looking to reignite sectarian warfare as American forces ratchet back their combat role. To their credit, Sunni political leaders have condemned these by the United States against illicit taxes on imported auto parts. By March next year, it must comply with another ruling on a case brought by the United States about its lax enforcement of counterfeiting laws. China has also increasingly turned to the WTO to defend its interests. Last month, it challenged an American ban on Chinese poultry imports. It has another case against American anti-dumping policy. And there will be more. China has as big a stake as the United States in a well-functioning, lawful trading system. If it wants to protect its own rights, it will accept the WTO's rulings. LOCKING UP FEWER CHILDREN In the 1990s, states and localities began sending more and more children to juvenile lockups, often for months, while they awaited trial for nonviolent offenses or even noncriminal behavior like being 'unruly.' This was a disaster. Children who spend time in detention are far more likely to leave school, suffer alcohol or drug abuse problems or commit violent crimes as adults. A far better approach -- for these young people as well as overburdened government budgets -- is to lock up only truly dangerous children and enroll the rest in community-based monitoring programs. The Annie E. Casey Foundation, which focuses on disadvantaged children, gave a boost to this approach by underwriting juvenile justice reform projects in five states in the early 1990s. The experiments showed that closely supervising young offenders, instead of incarcerating them, did not increase the youth crime rate or the risk to public safety. Similar programs have since been adopted in 110 jurisdictions in 27 states and the District of Columbia. According to a new study from the foundation, the results have been astonishing: Many jurisdictions have managed to cut the number of children in detention by half or more; in many, the youth crime rate has declined. The programs invite collaboration among all of the major players, including prosecutors, probation officers and public defenders. Children who present no safety threat remain in custody for the shortest possible time. Meanwhile, new screening practices allow judges and other officials to decide more accurately and quickly which children require secure detention and which of them can be released to their families or to the care of community programs while they await their day in court. Communities that have been most faithful to the new model have registered the most impressive results, with some districts locking up only about a quarter of the number of youngsters as before. These efforts show that it is possible to treat children humanely without compromising public safety and deserve to be replicated nationwide. 