Two Iraqis were killed and nine others wounded when Iraqi National Guardsmen raided a mosque in Baghdad's Adhamiya neighborhood, witnesses and medical sources said Friday.

"We have received two killed and nine wounded, eight of them in serious condition," an official in the Al-Numan hospital said.

Clashes erupted following the Friday prayers inside the Abu Hanifa mosque, the most important Sunni Muslim mosque in Iraq, wounding two people.

Hundreds of Iraqi National Guardsmen stormed the mosque, throwing sound grenades and firing shots in the air, witnesses said.

The mosque Imam Sheikh Muayed al-Adhami was arrested during his sermon for his remarks that after the US-Iraqi offensive against Fallujah, Latifiyah, another southern flashpoint city would be targeted.

US forces arrived at the scene shortly afterwards, entering the mosque and taking positions on building roofs, the witnesses said.

Source: Xinhua