Roadside bomb kills 11-year-old in north Iraq

BAGHDAD — Authorities say a roadside bomb has killed an 11-year-old boy and wounded his two friends in the violence-plagued city of Mosul in northern Iraq.

A Mosul police officer says the bomb exploded around 4 p.m. after a police patrol that was the apparent targeted had already passed by. The officer spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to the media.

He says elsewhere in Mosul an off-duty Iraqi soldier was killed in a drive-by shooting.

Mosul is in an area rife with tension between Arabs and Kurds over territory.

The U.S. military says it is also the last urban battleground of al-Qaida in Iraq and other Sunni extremist groups. The level of violence there remains high even as it has dropped elsewhere in Iraq.