BAGHDAD, Iraq — A bomb exploded alongside a group of Iraqi men waiting for work in eastern Baghdad today, killing at least eight and wounding more than 50, as a key Sunni Arab leader threatened to call for a nationwide "uprising" unless the Shiite interior minister is replaced.

The blast occurred hours before the trial of Saddam Hussein and at least seven co-defendants resumed on charges of involvement in the 1982 killings of more than 140 people. It was unclear if the two events were linked.

Iraq's top Shiite, Kurdish and Sunni Arab leaders also held high-level talks today in Baghdad as part of efforts to form a national unity government and bring Iraq's rampant violence under control. The talks have been complicated by rising sectarian tensions among Sunni Arabs and Shiites.

Baghdad's latest bomb attack struck at about 7 a.m. near the Sunni Muslim al-Samaraei mosque in the New Baghdad neighborhood. Police sealed off the area and the wounded were taken to nearby hospitals.

Col. Ahmed Abboud, chief of police in New Baghdad, cited eyewitnesses saying a man placed a bag full of explosives near a cart that sold tea to men waiting near a crowded intersection for a day's work.

"The people did not suspect him when he first came with the bag because all workers carry their food in such bags," Abboud told The Associated Press.

Abboud and another police official, Capt. Mohammed Jassim Jaber, said at least eight people were killed and more than 50 wounded.

Meanwhile, Sunni Arab political leader Tariq al-Hashimi demanded the dismissal of Interior Minister Bayan Jabr and his senior staff. He also called for sending Iraqi troops into Baghdad neighborhoods instead of Interior Ministry commandoes, who have been accused of arbitrarily detaining Sunni Arabs.

Al-Hashimi also demanded the release of all detainees in Iraqi and U.S. custody, and the release of findings of an investigation into claims that Sunni Arab prisoners were mistreated in November in a jail run by the Interior Ministry in Baghdad's Jadriyah neighborhood.