3 killed as Iraqi forces raid cleric's office, clash with supporters

At least three people were killed Tuesday night when Iraqi security forces clashed with supporters of a radical Shiite cleric, police and health officials said, according to CNN. 

Officials said Iraqi forces raided the offices of cleric Mahmoud al-Hassani al-Sarkhi in Karbala and clashed with his supporters.

Nine people were wounded, and one military Humvee was set on fire, police said.

In 2006, the cleric's supporters attacked the Iranian consulate in Basra, about 500 kilometers (310 miles) south of Baghdad. Protesters were incensed about insulting remarks made about the cleric on an Iranian TV program. They threw stones and set fire to a building at the consulate.

The violence is not related to the ongoing battles between Iraqi forces and the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, which has taken over swaths of Iraq in recent weeks.

ISIS militants declared over the weekend that they have set up a caliphate -- or Islamic state -- spanning large areas of the two countries.