Twenty people were killed and some 30 others injured in suicide truck bomb explosion in a Kurdish village in Iraq's northern province of Nineveh early Thursday, a local police source said.

Residents stand as they look at the site of a bomb attack near Mosul, 390 km (240 miles) north of Baghdad, September 10, 2009. A suicide bomber drove a truck packed with explosives into a Kurdish village in north Iraq before dawn on Thursday.[Xinhua]

"The latest reports said that 20 people were killed, including ten from one family, and 30 others injured by the suicide truck bomb," the source told Xinhua on condition of anonymity.

The incident took place in the village of Wardek, some 390 km north of Baghdad, when a truck packed with explosives driven by a suicide bomber exploded while residents were sleeping after midnight, the source said.

Iraqi boys gather at the site of a bomb attack near Mosul, 390 km (240 miles) north of Baghdad, Sept. 10, 2009. A suicide bomber drove a truck packed with explosives into a Kurdish village in north Iraq before dawn on Thursday.[Xinhua]

The powerful blast flattened several clay and stone houses and severely caused damages to more than 40 others, the source said.

Residents and rescue teams retrieved many bodies and removed wounded people who were buried under the debris of demolished houses, he said.

A resident looks at a destroyed building and damaged vehicles after a bomb attack near Mosul, 390 km (240 miles) north of Baghdad, Sept. 10, 2009.[Xinhua]

Another truck bomber was killed by local Kurdish Peshmerga forces before he could detonate the second blast.

The bomb seems to be well-designed to foment up already existing tensions between Kurds and Arabs, who are vying for land and resources.

Nineveh province remains one of Iraq's most volatile areas despite the dramatic drop of violence in Iraq over the past two years.  

(Xinhua News Agency September 10, 2009)