Pro-Syrian defence minister injured in Lebanon blast

Lebanese security forces and civilians gather at the scene of a car bomb attack in Beirut yesterday. Lebanon's outgoing pro-Syrian Defence Minister Elias Murr was wounded in a car bomb explosion in a Christian suburb north of Beirut that killed at least two people and wounded six others, police said. PHOTO: AFP

Murr was driving himself from his home in an upscale Christian suburb 10km north of the capital when an estimated 40 kilogrammes (90 pounds) of TNT exploded in a nearby parked car.

The explosion killed two unidentified people, according to state television, and left nine others wounded aside from Murr. Seven cars were completely destroyed by the blast, which left a scene of devastation that has become all too familiar for Beirut residents

Murr, deputy prime minister and son-in-law of pro-Syrian President Emile Lahoud, was taken with superficial burns and a hand injury to Serhal hospital, from where he issued a statement aimed at "reassuring the Lebanese".

"Thank God I am in good health and I wish a speedy recovery for all the bodyguards and the wounded. We must support them as the country is going through a very difficult period," he said from his hospital bed.

This was the third apparent attack on a leading political figure within the space of less than two months. However the previous two bomb blasts that killed a journalist and an ex-communist leader targeted anti-Syrian figures.

Syria, which pulled its troops out from Lebanon in April amid relentless international pressure following the February assassination of anti-Damascus former prime minister Rafiq Hariri, fiercely condemned the new attack.

"Syria considers this terrorist act as one link in a series of explosions and assassinations aimed at destabilising Lebanon and weakening its national unity," the official Sana agency quoted an information ministry official as saying.

Druze leader Walid Jumblatt claimed that the attack was aimed at silencing a man who could potentially give incriminating evidence to international investigators still probing the Hariri murder.