Special report: Tension escalates in Iraq

    BAGHDAD, Sept. 22 (Xinhua) -- Some 150 Sunni Arab families were displaced from a mixed Sunni and Shiite neighborhood after clashes between residents and Mahdi Army militia, loyal to radical Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, an Interior Ministry said on Saturday.

    The families fled their homes in Washash district to other predominantly Sunni districts of Adel and Ghazaliyah in western Baghdad after fierce clashes erupted late on Thursday, the source told Xinhua on condition of anonymity.

    The clashes broke out after gunmen opened fire on Hammoudi Naji, a local leader of Mahdi Army militia which control the neighborhood, he added.

    The overnight clashes resulted in the killing of six people, including four women, the source said, adding that several houses were also damaged.

    Early on Friday, U.S. and Iraqi forces sealed off the neighborhood and searched several houses in the neighborhood, headed.

    Adnan al-Dulaimi, head of the Iraqi Accordance Front, a key Sunni political bloc, said on Friday that Mahdi Army militiamen forced dozens of Sunni families to flee their homes in the Washash neighborhood.

    On August 29, Sadr ordered his Shiite Mahdi Army militia to suspend its activities for six months after deadly clashes killed52 people during a Shiite religious festival in the holy city of Karbala, some 110 km south of Baghdad.