The Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party – Iraq Region ( Ḥizb al-Ba‘th al-'Arabī al-Ishtirākī fī al-'Irāq), officially the Iraqi Regional Branch, is an Iraqi Ba'athist political party founded in 1951 by Fuad al-Rikabi. It was the Iraqi regional branch of the original Ba'ath Party before changing its allegiance to the Iraqi-dominated Ba'ath movement following the 1966 split within the original party. The party was officially banned following the American invasion of Iraq in 2003, but despite this it still continues to function underground. History Early years and 14 July Revolution: 1951–1958 The Iraqi Regional Branch of the Ba'ath Party was established in 1951 or 1952. Some historians claim that the Iraqi Regional Branch was established by Abd ar Rahman ad Damin and Abd al Khaliq al Khudayri in 1947 after their return from the founding congress of the Ba'ath Party held in Damascus, Syria the same year. In another version, Fuad al-Rikabi established the Iraqi Regional Branch in 1948 with Sa'dun Hamadi, a Shia Muslim, but became secretary of the Regional Command in 1952. The Iraqi Regional Branch was Arab nationalist and vague in its socialist orientation. Al-Rikabi, expelled from the party in 1961 for being a Nasserist, was an early follower of Michel Aflaq, the founder of Ba'athism. During the party's early days, members discussed topics regarding Arab nationalism, the social inequalities that had grown out of the British "Tribal Criminal and Civil Disputes Regulation," and the Iraqi Parliament's Law 28 of 1932 "Governing the Rights and Duties of Cultivators". By 1953, the party, led by al-Rikabi, was engaged in subversive activities against the government. The party initially consisted of a majority of Shia Muslims, as al-Rikabi primarily recruited his friends and family, but it slowly became Sunni-dominated. The Ba'ath Party, and others of pan-Arab orientation, found it increasingly difficult to recruit Shia members within the party organisation. Most Shias saw pan-Arab as largely Sunni, since most Arabs are Sunni. As a result, more Shias joined the Iraqi Communist Party than the Ba'ath Party. In the mid-1950s, eight of 17 members of the Ba'ath leadership were Shia. According to Talib El-Shibib, the Ba'ath foreign minister in the Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr government, the sectarian background of the leading Ba'ath members was considered of little importance because most Ba'athists did not know each other's sectarian denominations. Between 1952 and 1963, 54% of the members of the Ba'ath Regional Command were Shia Muslims,