Special report: Tension escalates in Iraq

    TIKRIT, Iraq, April 1 (Xinhua) -- A total of seven Iraqi policemen were killed and another was injured in separate incidents in Salahudin province Saturday night, a source from U.S. and Iraqi liaison office said on Sunday.

    A group of unidentified armed men showered bullets on a police vehicle heading for Balad City, some 80 km north of Baghdad, killing six policemen aboard, the source from the Joint Coordination Center in Tikrit told Xinhua.

    In a separate incident, insurgents killed a police Major and wounded another in al-Qadisyiah neighborhood in northern Tikrit, some 170 km north of Baghdad, the source added.

    Violence persists in Baghdad and other Iraqi cities despite the presence of tens of thousands of U.S. and Iraqi soldiers across the country in a major security crackdown aimed at curbing insurgency and sectarian violence in the war-torn country.