(CNN) -- Al Qaeda claimed responsibility Thursday for a bombing a day earlier in Algeria that killed four police officers and wounded 20 people at a building housing security forces.
Algerian bomb experts gather at the site of a suicide attack Wednesday outside a police station in Naciria.
An al Qaeda statement said one of the terror group's operatives detonated a truck bomb with more than 1,100 pounds of explosives "to attack the infidels" who combat extremists.
The blast happened in Naciria, a city of 15,000 people east of Algiers, the state-run Algeria Press Agency reported.
The country's Interior Ministry said eight police officers and 12 civilians were wounded in the bombing.
Islamic extremists in Algeria and other North African countries have stepped up attacks in recent years.
An al Qaeda affiliate in Algeria claimed responsibility for the deadliest attack in that country's capital in 10 years -- a bombing last April that destroyed the prime minister's headquarters and a police base, killing at least 24 people and wounding more than 220. E-mail to a friend 
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