BASRA, Iraq, Jan 18 (Reuters) - Iraqi police clashed with gunmen from a Shi'ite cult who staged a series of hit-and-run raids in two southern cities on Friday, security officials said.

Witnesses in Iraq's southern oil hub of Basra and Nassiriya said at least four people may have been killed in the violence, in which gunmen were reported to be using heavy machine guns and mortars.

The reported clashes came as religious observations for the annual Ashura festival, one of the holiest events in the Shi'ite Muslim religious calendar, approached their peak across southern Iraq.

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