Up to 25 people were killed Monday in a horrific suicide car bomb attack targeting an Iraqi army convoy in Mosul city, Xinhua reported.
Seventeen soldiers and 12 passers-by were wounded in the attack, some 400 km north of the Iraqi capital, a police source said.
The attack took place in the morning when a suicide bomber rammed his explosive-laden car into the convoy.
The region has long been a stronghold for insurgent groups, including Al Qaeda militants, since the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003.
Iraq is witnessing its worst eruption of violence in five years.