A car bomb has killed at least 10 people and injured another 30 in a busy market northeast of Baghdad.
The suicide bomber targeted a convoy of police vehicles driving through a market in the town of Balad Ruz, 50km southeast of Baquba in the province of Diyala on Sunday
At least 10 cars, six of them police vehicles, were destroyed by the fire. Two police officers were among the dead, Faris Hussein, the Balud Ruz police chief, said.
In a separate incident on Sunday, gunmen at a mock checkpoint killed five people and wounded seven others when they opened fire on two minibuses near Baquba.
Extra troops
Diyala is a large religiously and ethnically diverse province which has seen some of the worst violence in Iraq since the US-led invasion in March 2003.
Sectarian killings and attacks by al-Qaeda have occurred regularly in the region, which is a mainly Sunni province - but also has Shia and Kurdish populations.
Around 3,000 extra US troops have been sent to Diyala to combat a recent increase in violence.
Figures released on Saturday showed that nearly 2,000 civilians had been killed in Iraq in the month of May.
May's death toll has risen by 29 per cent from April and the represents the highest monthly toll since the start of a security crackdown in Baghdad in February.