BAGHDAD: A teenage Iraqi girl who claimed her husband's female relatives strapped explosives on her has been sentenced to seven and a half years in prison for attempting to blow herself up at a checkpoint in northeastern Iraq, a provincial judge said yesterday.

The sentence comes amid a rising number of female suicide bombers in Iraq, which has prompted US and Iraqi forces to step up efforts to train more female police to search women for explosives.

Rania Ibrahim was sentenced on Sunday in a juvenile court for the attempted attack on Iraqi security forces near Baqouba in August 2008, said Diyala provincial Judge Zaid Khalaf.