Thursday, January 27 2005 10:23 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Arbil, Iraq: At least 15 people were killed and 30 wounded in a truck bombing outside the offices of a Kurdish political party in northern Iraq yesterday (Jan 26, 2005) that was claimed by an Al-Qaeda linked militant group.

"The truck, packed with one tonne of TNT, exploded outside the local offices of the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP)" in the northwestern town of Sinjar, town council chief Dekhil Qassem Hassoun said.

Ten cars were burnt and half of the KDP building destroyed along with partial damage to neighbouring buildings. The attack was claimed by militants loyal to al-Qaeda's Iraq frontman Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who said it was a suicide operation in a statement posted on the Internet.

"One of the lions of the martyr brigades launched a truck packed with explosives against the offices of the apostate KDP, located in Sinjar. Dozens of bodies were pierced by the explosion," said the statement, whose authenticity could not be independently verified.

The province of Nineveh, centered on the main northern city of Mosul, has seen a spate of sectarian violence between Sunni Arabs and Kurds.

The mountains around Sinjar are home to the Yezidi community, a Kurdish minority that has remained faithful to its pre-Islamic religion.