Iraq suicide truck bomb kills 27

MOSUL (AFP) - A suicide bomber blew up a truck packed with explosives in a largely Shiite village in northern Iraq on Monday, killing 27 people, police Brigader General Abdulkarim Khalaf al-Juburi said.

Another 28 people were wounded in the blast in Al-Guba village, 20 kilometres (about 12 miles) northwest of Tal Afar, said Juburi, a police spokesman for Nineveh province, which lies on the Syrian border.

The mayor of Tal Afar, Major General Najim Abdallah, had initially said that four people were killed and 19 wounded in the explosion.

As thousands of US and Iraqi security forces focus on pushing insurgents out of Baghdad and other flashpoint cities under a five-month-old security plan, militants have increasingly resorted to attacks in villages and outlying rural areas.