Information Minister Mohammed Adwan insisted riot police had been obliged to move in force to capture an "armed band of outlaws" who had been "terrorizing" residents.

However, the Islamic opposition in parliament demanded the security forces immediately "end the siege."

Jordanian officials told AFP the manhunt had nothing to do with the killing of U.S. diplomat Laurence Foley, who was gunned down outside his Amman home on October 28 in the first such slaying of a foreign diplomat.

However, since the killing police have been bringing in known Islamic figures for questioning.

"One Maan resident was killed and two seriously wounded," a top official told AFP.

There were also "several other casualties among civilians and police," the official said, without elaborating.

Earlier, another official said several policemen, including an officer, Captain Ahmad Amin Abdel Latif, were wounded in the clashes after thousands of security personnel moved into the Islamist stronghold at dawn to hunt for a dozen wanted militants.

The top official said the five chief suspects - including alleged ringleader Mohammed al-Shalabi, also known as Abu Sayyaf, who already escaped a police dragnet late last month - remained on the run.

"The operation will continue until he is arrested."

The second official said at least 17 arrests had been confirmed and the number could top 50.

The authorities said that they were hunting a dozen Islamic activists, wanted since January riots, when thousands of riot police and other security personnel equipped with armored vehicles surrounded the town late Saturday, November 9.

The suspects had been "terrorizing the population, carrying weapons and bombs in the public streets and setting on fire the homes and cars of women students and of university staff," the information minister charged.

But the kingdom's main opposition party, the Islamic Action Front (IAF), described the casualties as "deplorable", saying they showed the government was acting with a "martial mentality."

The security forces moved in at dawn in the face of the repeated refusal of the town's still dominant tribes to hand over the wanted men.

A tribal gathering in Amman last week, attended by 3,000 people, rejected government mediation efforts and threatened a "bloodbath" if the authorities tried to enter Maan.

Shalabi was wounded in a shoot-out with police late last month but escaped despite having gone to the town's main public hospital for treatment.

A policeman was also wounded in the gunfight.

Shalabi and the other Islamic gunmen have been on the authorities' wanted list since two days of riots in Maan in January, after the controversial killing of a 17-year-old student during his arrest by police.

One policeman was killed in those disturbances and another 11 were among 19 people wounded, as hundreds of demonstrators took to the streets of the town, damaging public buildings.

Maan is in one of Jordan's poorest provinces. In 1989, riots which left 12 people dead broke out there following a rise in bread prices.

Authorities are aware of the links between poverty and the rise of Islamic sentiment and in the past few years have launched several projects to build up the infrastructure in the province and boost development.

In October, when King Abdullah II visited Maan, the province's main tribes reaffirmed their allegiance to him.