Special report: Tension escalates in Iraq

    MOSUL, Iraq, Nov. 12 (Xinhua) -- Iraqi soldiers fought gunmen near the town of Tal Afar in Nineveh province early on Monday, killing four gunmen and detaining two others, a military source said.

    The troops fiercely clashed with the gunmen in the village of Mazra'a, 20 km west of Tal Afar, Captain Mohammad Chiyad, spokesman of the Iraqi 3rd Division, told Xinhua.

    The two detainees confessed that they committed many crimes, including the killing of Sheikh Mubarak al-Juhaishi, a tribal chieftain on Sunday in the village of Abu Maria near Tal Afar, 70 km west of Mosul, Chiyad said.

    Meanwhile, a U.S. military statement said that U.S. and Iraqi troops killed two "terrorists" and detained 47 others in the past few days during a major offensive in the province targeting al-Qaida militants.

    Tal Afar, some 430 km northwest of Baghdad, is an ethnically mixed town.