A stepped-up campaign by Iraq's prime minister against Saddam Hussein loyalists is alienating Sunni Muslims and stoking tensions between them and the majority Shiites ahead of key national elections.

In its latest anti-Baathist attack, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's Shiite-dominated government put three men on state television Sunday to confess their alleged role in planning homicide attacks in Baghdad last month. The three, all in detention and dressed in orange prison jumpsuits, said the bombings were ordered by Saddam's Baath Party.

Al-Maliki's intensified rhetoric worsens one of Iraq's most dangerous sectarian fault lines — one which the United States has long struggled to calm.