Attacks in Iraq killed 25 people Thursday as 11 car bombs struck nationwide, the latest in a surge of violence.

Attacks in Iraq killed 25 people Thursday as 11 car bombs struck nationwide, the latest in a surge of violence.

Attacks struck across the country, from the northern hub of Mosul to Kut in the south. They cut down civilians as well as security forces in a wide variety of incidents targeting markets, bus stations, a funeral tent and the convoy of a top police official, security and medical sources said.

Babil province, south of Baghdad, suffered the lion's share of the car bombs, as a half-dozen struck provincial capital Hilla and nearby towns, killing six people and leaving dozens more wounded.

Another vehicle rigged with explosives targeting Salaheddin provincial police chief Major General Juma al-Dulaimi killed three civilians and wounded two others.

Dulaimi himself escaped unharmed from the blast in the restive city of Tikrit, which lies north of the capital.

A suicide car bombing at a police checkpoint near Samarra, also in Salaheddin, killed three police and wounded three more.

Two more car bombs in Salaheddin and two others in Wasit, south of Baghdad, killed three people and wounded 15 overall.

Meanwhile in Baghdad, a roadside bomb targeting a patrol of Sahwa anti-Al-Qaeda-militiamen killed two people, one of them a Sahwa fighter, and two other bombs elsewhere in the capital left four dead.

The bloodshed, in which more than 6,000 people have been killed this year, is part of the worst prolonged stretch of unrest since 2008 and comes just months before a general election.