Anti-Syrian MP killed in Beirut blast

Lebanese security forces inspect the scene of a car bomb explosion in Beirut's Mkalles Christian suburb, which targeted and killed leading anti-Syrian journalist and MP Gibran Tueni. Firemen recovered the body of the Christian MP, 48, from his car, which was set ablaze by the blast. Three other people were also killed and 10 were wounded in the attack.. PHOTO: AFP

Three other people also died and 10 were wounded in the explosion that blew up Teuni's armoured SUV car as it was driving in the Mekalis area of mainly Christian east Beirut.

At least three people inside the car were killed, their bodies charred beyond recognition, witnesses said.

One witness said the bomb blew up inside Christian MP Gibran Tueni's vehicle, blasting it off the road and setting it ablaze.

Firemen recovered the body of Tueni, 48, that of his driver Nicolas Flouti and two other people, the sources said. Ten other people were wounded, two of them seriously, in the attack at around 9 am (0700 GMT) in the Christian suburb of Mkalles.

The attack came just a day after UN chief investigator Detlev Mehlis delivered a report to UN Secretary General Kofi Annan on Syria's cooperation with the probe into the February murder of Lebanese ex-premier Rafiq Hariri.

And Druze leader and fellow MP Walid Jumblatt immediately pointed the finger at Syria over the bombing.

"The terrorist message has come to us... the person who threatened on television to make the whole world pay the price," he said, alluding to remarks made by Syrian President Bashar al-Assad on Russian television on Sunday.

Bashar, referring to possible UN sanctions against Damascus, said that if the situation in Syria and Iraq was not good, the Middle East would be unstable and the whole world would pay.

But Syria denied any role in the bombing, at least the 13th in Lebanon since Hariri was killed in a massive bomb blast on the Beirut seafront on February 14.

Syrian Information Minister Mehdi Dakhlallah told Lebanese television LBC that "foreign interference is at the root of the current chaos."

Many Lebanese blame Damascus for Hariri's death, a charge Syria denies, although it has been implicated in a report into the killing by the Mehlis commission.

Later on Monday, the UN Security Council was due to receive the sensitive Mehlis report.

There was no word on the content of Mehlis's latest report, which follows one in October that concluded that senior Syrian and Lebanese security officials were implicated in the killing and chided Damascus for failing to cooperate fully with the probe.