Blast rocks northern Iraqi town

The Baghdad bomb went off as a minibus was passing

Fresh violence in Iraq has left at least 37 people dead with 28 of them killed by a suicide truck bomb in the northern town of Tal Afar, police say.

The blast hit a mainly Shia district of the mixed town and injured about 40, with some feared trapped under rubble.

A curfew was imposed across Tal Afar, which was once held up as a showcase for US-led efforts to pacify Iraq.

In Baghdad, a roadside bomb hit commuters, killing nine and injuring eight, police and hospital sources say.

The Tal Afar bomber was driving a dump truck filled with explosives covered by a thin layer of gravel, police and local officials said.

The town has seen mounting bomb attacks and shootings this year.

On 27 March, a truck bomb claimed by al-Qaeda-linked militants killed 152 people and injured 347 in a Shia district of Tal Afar, according to an Iraqi interior ministry casualty count.

Some 70 Sunni men were shot dead shortly afterwards in apparent reprisals by Shia gunmen.