Sunni militants have seized the northern Iraqi city of Tal Afar, officials and residents say.
Militants led by ISIS - the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant - captured key cities including Mosul and Tikrit last week, but some towns were retaken.
UN human rights chief Navi Pillay said the "apparently systematic series of executions [of non-combatants] almost certainly amounted to war crimes".
The US earlier announced it might use drone strikes to halt the ISIS advance.
"They're not the whole answer, but they may well be one of the options that are important," said US Secretary of State John Kerry.
Iranian co-operation?
The Pentagon said US officials were also open to holding direct talks with Iran over Iraq, but there was "no plan to co-ordinate military activity" between the two countries.
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani earlier said he would consider co-operation if the US took action.
The USS George HW Bush aircraft carrier has already been deployed to the Gulf, accompanied by two more warships. But Washington says no US troops will be deployed on the ground.
Britain reiterated on Monday that it had no plans for military intervention in Iraq.
Iran said it was ready to assist Iraq in its battle against ISIS insurgents, seen here in Nineveh
One reason Tal Afar was important for the government to hold was that the city was the state's only outpost in the entire province of Nineveh, which fell to the Sunni militants last week as the army collapsed.
It is also strategically significant, straddling the main highway from Mosul, the provincial capital, to the Syrian border.
However, assuming Tal Afar has indeed fallen to the militants, it does not mean they have a direct link to Syria - the border crossing at Rabia is controlled on the eastern side by Iraqi Kurdish Peshmerga fighters, and on the western side by the Popular Protection Units (YPG), the armed wing of the Syrian Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD), which is fiercely hostile to ISIS.
Tal Afar is important for other reasons too. Most of the areas through which the Sunni militants swept last week were largely Sunni populated. Tal Afar has a big Shia community, from the Turkmen minority, perhaps one reason why it held out longer than any other town in Nineveh.
Some observers believe it is important for Iran - which sees itself as the custodian of the Shia - that Tal Afar should not be allowed to fall, and that they would sooner or later wreak revenge, especially if abuses were committed during or after its capture.
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