Fighting between the Iraqi military and radical Sunni Muslims spread Sunday to a new centre in northern Iraq as an aide of Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki denied that Iranian forces had come to the beleaguered premier's aide.
Fierce clashes erupted between government troops and fighters from the jihadist Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), which attempted to capture the town of Tel Afar west of the rebel-held city of Mosul, informs DPA.
At least 18 ISIL insurgents were killed and five armored vehicles belonging to the extremist Sunni group were destroyed in the fighting, the independent news site Shafaaq reported, citing an unnamed security official.
But the ISIL claimed that it had put "thousands" of government troops to flight and captured one district of the town.
Meanwhile al-Maliki's press adviser said reports in Britain's Guardian newspaper that 2,000 Iranian volunteer troops had entered Iraq to shore up al-Maliki's military were "lies."
"These reports are intended to distort the confrontation between Iraqis as a whole and ISIL and similar terrorist organizations," Ali al-Mousawi said.
ISIL and other Sunni rebels - some of them linked to the Baath Party of former leader Saddam Hussein - have portrayed al-Maliki, a Shiite, as a stooge of Iran's Shiite-dominated government. The jihadists have regularly used inflammatory anti-Shiite language.
Social media accounts used by the ISIL posted photographs overnight of scores of men in civilian clothes being shot dead. The posts said they were "Shiite soldiers" captured by ISIL forces.
The group on Friday said it had executed 1,700 Shiite soldiers after taking them prisoner and 800 Sunni captives had been "pardoned."
Al-Mousawi said, however, that "the situation is improving as the regular army regains the initiative."
He said the fighting had put political concerns on the back burner, saying it was too early to talk about whether al-Maliki would take up a third term as premier after his bloc came first in April's parliamentary elections.
"We will eliminate terrorism first and then talk about forming a government," he said in a telephone interview.
The violence has raised international fears that Iraq is falling apart after ISIL fighters last week captured the northern province of Nineveh, including Mosul, and swathes of the province of Salah al-Din further south.
Troops loyal to al-Maliki said they have launched a counteroffensive and in the past two days have regained several areas from the ISIL, an al-Qaeda splinter group.
Iraqi media said government troops, backed by thousands of volunteers, were preparing to wrest Mosul and the central city of Tikrit back from the insurgents.
In Baghdad, at least 12 people were killed and 28 wounded in a suicide bombing, police said.
Authorities have stepped up security in and around Baghdad in the past few days in anticipation of an ISIL offensive to capture the mostly Shiite capital.
Meanwhile, three Kurdish soldiers were killed and 14 wounded in two separate incidents in eastern Iraq, where insurgents are pressing on with a campaign to widen their territorial advances.
The militants' blitz in Iraq has prompted the Peshmerga, the autonomous Kurdish region's official military, to take control of several areas at the centre of internal boundary disputes with the federal government. They include the oil-rich city of Kirkuk.
Iraq has seen increasing violence over the past year, much of it blamed on the ISIL and aimed at security forces and Shiite civilians.
The Shiite-led government's response, with security sweeps and mass arrests, has alienated Iraq's Sunni minority, from which ISIL and other rebel groups draw their support.
About 800,000 people have been displaced by the fighting in Iraq, according to the United Nations.
The United States said Saturday that it had dispatched an aircraft carrier to the Gulf.
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