At least 85 people were killed today by a suicide truck bomb in the volatile Iraqi city of Kirkuk.
A man walks past a burning vehicle after a bomb attack in Kirkuk
Police also said 180 people were wounded, and they warned the death toll could rise from the blast in the northern city, shared by Kurds, Turkmen, Shia and Sunni Arabs.
The blast, near an office of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan of Iraqi President Jalal Talaban, was one of several attacks in Kirkuk that is supposed to vote this year on whether to join semi-autonomous Kurdistan.
"Tens of houses and shops were totally destroyed by the power of the explosion," the city's deputy chief of police said. Dozens of cars were set on fire, and passengers were trapped on a bus where they burned to death, said a witness.
Police said 25 of the wounded were in a critical condition and that many bodies might still be in the rubble.
The truck detonated minutes apart from a car bomb in a busy Kirkuk shopping area that wounded two people, police said.
A police officer was killed and four officers were wounded soon after, when a parked car bomb exploded in southern Kirkuk, police said. A fourth car bomb was discovered and made safe.
US and Iraqi forces have undertaken major security clampdowns since the last of 28,000 extra US troops ordered to the country by President George W. Bush arrived last month.