BAGHDAD — A suicide bombing today in the city of Baqouba killed seven people and wounded 22, while authorities increased the death toll from a Baghdad suicide attack at a funeral Tuesday to 36.

In today's attack, the bomber detonated his explosives near a hospital in the center of the city, the capital of volatile Diyala province, 35 miles northeast of Baghdad.

The dead included a policeman and two members of a U.S.-backed armed volunteer group, the Brigades of 1920s Revolution, a police officer said. The volunteer groups — predominantly Sunni tribal groups known as Awakening Councils who have turned against al-Qaida and are paid by the U.S. military to protect their areas — have been credited with contributing to an overall decline in violence by 60 percent since June.

But members of the rapidly expanding movement, dubbed "Concerned Local Citizens" by the U.S. military, were singled out by Osama bin Laden recently as a "disgrace and shame," and are increasingly becoming targets.

BRISBANE, Australia — A snake was saved by surgery in Australia after mistaking four golf balls for a meal of chicken eggs, a veterinarian said.A couple had placed the balls in their chicken coup in New South Wales state to encourage their hen to nest, the Australian Associated Press reported. The eggs disappeared. However, the couple found a lumpy-looking carpet python nearby. They took the 32-inch nonvenomous snake to the Currumbin Wildlife Sanctuary, where senior veterinarian Michael Pyne operated to remove the balls from the snake's intestine.The snake was making a speedy recovery, Pyne said. "If it hadn't been found, it would have died for sure," he added.