Female suicide bomber holding her BABY is pictured moments before she blew the two of them up in Mosul in a bid to slaughter soldiers.

A photograph has emerged of a Mosul woman cradling her baby as she seemingly tries to escape the fighting that has ravaged her city.

However on further inspection it becomes apparent the Burka clad woman is also holding a detonator.

The picture was taken moments before the suicide bomber blew herself up, with her baby in her arms, as she walked past Iraqi troops.

The woman was walking out of a newly liberated area of the city with a group of fleeing civilians holding a trigger, bags and a young infant in her arms.

She had apparently tried to detonate the explosives as she passed the soldiers, but the bomb failed to go off until she had walked some distance away, a cameraman for local al-Mawsleya TV said.

She, her child and two soldiers were killed, several civilians were also injured in the blast.