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How strong is Iraq's army? In 45 seconds
Sunni militants have seized the northern Iraqi city of Tal Afar, officials and residents say.
Militants led by ISIS - the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant - captured key cities including Mosul and Tikrit last week, but some towns were retaken.
Fighting in Tal Afar began on Sunday, with mortar shelling of some districts as militants tried to enter the city.
The Iraqi military setback came as the US said it was considering direct talks with Iran on Iraq.
Diplomatic contacts on regional security between the US and Iran are unusual, but not unprecedented. There were significant contacts between them in the wake of the 9/11 attacks. Iran was strongly opposed to the Taliban and their jihadist allies in al-Qaeda. So what might the two countries talk about now?
Iraq's Prime Minister Nouri Maliki is a close ally of Iran. Objectively, however much it is frustrated with Mr Maliki's Shia sectarianism, keeping him in power may be seen in Washington as the best of a bad set of options. One hope may be that Tehran might be persuaded to bring some leverage to bear to encourage Mr Maliki to be more inclusive in his politics.
But the balance now between Washington and Tehran has changed dramatically since Saddam Hussein's overthrow when the US was in the ascendant. Now it is probably Tehran that holds more of the cards.
US President Barack Obama is weighing up options on action to take in Iraq.
The USS George HW Bush aircraft carrier is already being deployed to the Gulf, accompanied by two more warships. But Washington says no US troops will be deployed on the ground.
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani has said he will consider co-operation if the US takes action in Iraq.
Mixed cityTal Afar, which has a mixed Sunni and Shia population, some ethnic Turkmen, lies between Mosul and the border with Syria.
A Tal Afar resident reached by phone has told the Associated Press news agency that militants in pick-up trucks mounted with machine guns and flying black jihadi banners were roaming the streets as gunfire rang out.
"Residents are gripped by fear and most of them have already left the town to areas held by Kurdish security forces," said Hadeer al-Abadi, as he prepared to head out of town with his family.
But the Iraqi government insists the town is still largely in government hands; it quoted the commanding general there as saying he expected to finish off the ISIS fighters within a matter of hours, says the BBC's Jim Muir in northern Iraq.
The government also says it has "regained the initiative" against an offensive by Sunni rebels.
ISIS in Iraq- The Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIS) has 3,000 to 5,000 fighters, and grew out of an al-Qaeda-linked organisation in Iraq
- Joined in its offensives by other Sunni militant groups, including Saddam-era officers and soldiers, and disaffected Sunni tribal fighters
- ISIS has exploited the standoff between the Iraqi government and the minority Sunni Arab community, which complains that Shia Prime Minister Nouri Maliki is monopolising power
- The organisation is led by Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, an obscure figure regarded as a battlefield commander and tactician
Earlier, Iraqi army spokesman Lt Gen Qasim Ata said the military had scored successes against the militants in several areas, killing 279 of them. The figure could not be independently verified.
Local TV stations say government helicopters carried out a raid during the night on a military base near Mosul, which was captured by the militants last week.
Government forces were reported to be building up in the city of Samarra, north of Baghdad, ready for a counter-offensive on Tikrit.
'Horrifying'Meanwhile, the US condemned as "horrifying" photos posted online by Sunni militants that appear to show fighters massacring Iraqi soldiers.
In the scenes, the soldiers are shown being led away and lying in trenches before and after their "execution".
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The images appear to show captured Iraqi soldiers in civilian clothes being led away by militants, as the BBC's John Simpson reports
The Iraqi military said the pictures were real, but their authenticity has not been independently confirmed.
If the photographs are genuine, this would be by far the biggest single atrocity since the time of the American-led invasion of Iraq in 2003.
The United States has begun evacuating some diplomatic staff from Baghdad, moving them to Kurdish-controlled territory in the north-east and to Basra in the south.
The US has also announced it is increasing security at its embassy in Baghdad and relocating some staff to safer areas.
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