Kurdish peshmerga forces and Turkmen Shiite paramilitaries were Sunday engaged in clashes that have killed nine people in a flashpoint town and closed the highway to Baghdad, officials said. Tuz Khurmatu, part of a swathe of territory claimed by both Iraq's autonomous Kurdish region and Baghdad, has been divided between Turkmen and Kurds since fighting erupted between the two sides last year. A peshmerga brigadier general and another fighter and two members of Turkmen forces were among the nine people killed, said Shallal Abdul Baban, the Kurdish official responsible for the area.
