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A car bomb has killed four people and injured 40 at a market on the outskirts of the northern Iraqi city of Mosul, police sources told the BBC.

All of those killed or injured in the blast in Kukchali, a mixed Sunni-Shia area to the east of Mosul, are believed to be civilians.

Mosul, with its volatile ethnic and religious mix, has seen numerous attacks by insurgents.

The blast comes less than two weeks after US troops left Iraqi cities.

Correspondents say the bomb went off in an area with a predominantly Shia population, thought to be from Iraq's Shabak community.

On Wednesday two car bombs went off outside Shia mosques in Mosul, killing at least 14 people and injuring about 30. According to Reuters news agency, Shabak areas were targeted in both attacks.

Mosul, a city of about 1.8 million people about 400km (250 miles) north-west of the capital Baghdad, is mainly populated by Iraqi Arabs with Kurdish and other ethnic minorities.

US and Iraqi officials have described the city as al-Qaeda in Iraq's last major urban stronghold in the country.

BBC