An Iraqi Kurdish editor of a magazine that advocates relations between the Kurdistan region and Israel has been missing for more than 10 days, a journalist and a media rights group said on Wednesday.

Mawlud Afand, the editor-in-chief of the Israel-Kurd Institute's magazine, has been missing since June 8, said Diyari Mohammed, a correspondent for the magazine in Sulaimaniyah, in the autonomous Kurdistan region of northern Iraq.

Media watchdog Reporters Without Borders expressed concern about the missing journalist.

"We fear the worst and we urge the autonomous Kurdistan Regional Governments authorities to do everything possible to find" Afand, RSF said in a statement on its website, calling for an immediate investigation.

During a visit to Sulaimaniyah, Afand "went alone for an appointment... and disappeared," Mohammed said.

"He called in the afternoon the next day and told us that he was on a private visit and would return back after a week," he said.

A woman who spoke Persian answered Afand's phone on June 13, but it has been switched off since then, Mohammed said, adding Afand's colleagues have raised the possibility he was kidnapped by Iranian intelligence.

Mohammed said the president of the Israel-Kurd Institute, Dawood al-Baghistani, had been informed by the Kurdistan region's government last year that Iran wanted the magazine closed, but that Kurdistan declined to do so.

RSF said the magazine "promotes better relations between Israelis and Kurds and encourages Kurdish Jews who emigrated to Israel to return to Kurdistan," noting that "its aims and activities are controversial and constitute a major source of discord between the Kurdistan Regional Government and Iran."

Iran has alleged its arch-foe Israel was operating in Kurdistan, claims the region has rejected as "untrue."

On May 5, Tehran's consul in Arbil, Azim Hosseini, said Iran's security agencies had found evidence that "Israelis are in Kurdistan, and they are working against Iran."

"Israelis are working under different passports and names and banners," he told Safil, a Kurdish weekly published in Arbil.

And on April 21, Iranian MP Esmaeel Kosari told Al-Alam, an Iran-based Arabic-language news channel, that Kurdistan and Azerbaijan "should know that the presence of the Zionist regime on their soil will be harmful to them."

"The neighbouring nations should not allow this regime to have any activities against Iran."

The Kurdistan regional government responded by saying: "This is not the first time that Iranian officials are saying this without presenting evidence or reasons."

Car bomb wounds Iraqi judge, kills two: officials
Kirkuk, Iraq (AFP) June 20, 2012 - A car bomb on Wednesday in the north Iraq city of Kirkuk exploded as a judge's car was passing, wounding him and nine others and leaving two people dead, security and medical officials said.

The bomb exploded as Judge Aziz Abdullah of the Kirkuk criminal court was driving near the Kirkuk Palace hotel in the centre of the city, police Brigadier General Sarhad Qader said.

Qader, who put the toll at two dead and a total of 10 wounded, said the judge was in a stable condition.

Dr Mohammed Abdullah of Kirkuk General Hospital meanwhile put the toll at two dead and 12 wounded.

Details of those killed and others wounded in the attack were not immediately available.

Also on Wednesday, unknown gunmen using silenced weapons shot dead a female lawyer in her car north of Baghdad, an interior ministry official said.

The latest killings bring to at least 142 the number of people killed in attacks in Iraq since June 13 -- more than were killed in all of May, according to official figures.

Violence in Iraq has declined dramatically since its peak in 2006-2007, but attacks remain common. A total of 132 Iraqis were killed in violence in May, according to official figures.