At least 25 people have been killed in a suicide truck-bomb blast in the northern Iraqi town of Tal Afar.

At least 22 others were wounded and ten homes destroyed in Monday's attack in a crowded Shia area of the town and police said the death toll was expected to rise.

Rescue workers and locals were digging through rubble in an attempt to rescue survivors who may have been trapped.

The attacker drove a dump truck filled with explosives and covered with a thin layer of construction materials said Brigadier General Rahim al-Jibouri, commander of Tal Afar police.

Within an hour of the attack in the Saadeh district, the authorities imposed a complete curfew on the city, he said.

Kidnappings

Tal Afar - a town which the US military initially cited as success story it said its operations cleared the city of Sunni fighters - has been the site of frequent attacks in the past year.

Many of them stemmed from allegations by a 50-year-old Sunni Arab woman, who said last February that Iraqi soldiers raped her when they raided her house searching for weapons.

Sunni fighters have kidnapped and killed dozens of Iraqi security officials in response.

Meanwhile in Baghdad, a roadside bomb killed at least five people and wounded eight during rush hour, police said.

The bomb had been planted at the Zaafaraniyah intersection in the Jisr Diyala area, a predominantly Shia area.

PHOTO CAPTION

US Army partolling a neighborhood in the town of Tal Afar, north of Baghdad, 2005. (AFP)

Al-Jazeera