  We investigate the sources of parity asymmetry in the CMB temperature maps
using a pixel domain approach. We demonstrate that this anomaly is mainly
associated with the presence of two pairs of high asymmetry regions. The first
pair of peaks with Galactic coordinates $(l, b) = (212^\circ, -21^\circ)$ and
$(32^\circ, 21^\circ)$ is associated with the Northern Galactic Spur and the
direction of the dipole modulation of the power spectrum of the CMB anisotropy.
The other pair ($(l, b)=(332^\circ, -8^\circ)$ and $(152^\circ, 8^\circ)$) is
located within the Galactic plane (the Galactic Cold Spot and its antipodal
partner). Similar asymmetric peaks, but with smaller amplitudes, belong to the
WMAP/Planck Cold Spot and its partner in the Northern Galactic Spur. These
local anomalies increase the odd-multipole power to a level consistent with
Gaussian simulations. In contrast, the deficit of symmetric peaks is
accompanied by a deficit in the even-multipole power and is the source of the
parity asymmetry of the CMB temperature maps at the level of about 3 sigma. We
also evaluate the influence of the quadrupole, which is another source of the
even-multipole deficit. If the low quadrupole is an intrinsic feature of the
theoretical model, it will reduce the significance of the parity asymmetry to
around the 2 sigma level. We also investigate the relationship between the
asymmetry of the power spectrum and the level of the parity asymmetry in the
framework of a model with dipole modulation of a statistically uniform Gaussian
signal. We show that these two anomalies are innately linked to each other.
