21.   The confrontation escalated when Iraq fired missiles at U.S. and allied warplanes patrolling the no-fly zones.

22.   The confrontation has been escalating since Thursday, when bulldozers started clearing the land for a bypass road around Bethlehem.

23.   The South Asian rivals have fought three wars in the past half-century, and many fear a future confrontation could quickly escalate into a nuclear exchange.

24.   There is a fear that another confrontation would escalate into a nuclear war.

25.   But co-Premier Prince Norodom Ranariddh and co-Defense Minister Tea Banh denied the confrontation had escalated to large-scale factional fighting as the hardline Khmer Rouge claimed.