The New Nation - Internet Edition

Retuers, Baiji

The death toll in a suicide truck bombing in the northern Iraqi city of Baiji killed at least 22 people and wounded 70 on Tuesday, an Iraqi police official said.

Police had earlier put the death toll at 10. The bomber targeted a joint checkpoint manned by Iraqi security forces and armed volunteers who are working with the U.S. military.

The bomber blew up the truck, which was full of cooking gas cylinders, at the checkpoint manned by Iraqi soldiers and members of a local group fighting Al-Qaeda, the official from the joint Iraqi-US security coordination centre in Tikrit said.

A medic from the Baiji hospital confirmed the attack.

The security official said the attack took place at around 9:30 am (0630 GMT) in an area called Al-Ghaz near the northern outskirts of Baiji and close to the oil refinery from where fuel products are distributed across Iraq.

In the past few months insurgents have stepped up attacks in northern Iraq after being pushed out of western and central regions of the country following a series of military assaults.

US and Iraqi forces are currently involved in a massive military sweep in the northern provinces of Salaheddin -- which includes Baiji -- Nineveh and Kirkuk.