At least 15 Iraqi military officers were killed in an ambush on Saturday, Dec 21, in western Iraq's Sunni Muslim-dominated province of Anbar, military sources said, according to Reuters.

Several top-ranking officers were among those killed in the attack, the sources said.

Attacks in Iraq in November killed nearly 950 people, the majority of them civilians, in a recent surge in violence. According to figures compiled by the Iraqi Ministries of Health, Interior and Defense, 948 people were killed, among them 852 civilians, 53 policemen and 43 soldiers. The frequency of attacks has raised fears that the country is witnessing a return to the deadly sectarian violence of 2006 to 2008.