A suicide bomber detonated explosives strapped to his body in front of a police station in a Kurdish town near the Iranian border, killing eight people on the eve of Iraq’s crucial national election, Iraqi and US officials said.

The area around Saddam Hussein’s hometown of Tikrit, a hotbed of resistance since he was ousted by US-led coalition forces, was always an obvious retreat for the fallen dictator.

American forces captured a bearded Saddam Hussein, hiding in a hole in a farmhouse cellar near his hometown of Tikrit, the US military announced today.