Baghdad - Heavy clashes continued Saturday between Iraqi army and police forces and the Shiite militia Mahdi Army in southern Iraq, with the death toll in the fighting rising to over 80 killed so far, witnesses and security sources and media reports said. In Basra, some 550 kilometres south of Baghdad, helicopters attacked two houses in Hayaniya district, killing eight people and wounding another seven, witnesses told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa.
Nearby houses were also destroyed during the attacks.
Also in Basra, Iraqi forces attacked a house in Mawfiqiya district, leaving four people killed from the same family, a Sadrist official told dpa.
As the clashes between Iraqi security forces and Shiite fighters continued in Basra, medical sources told
