Jan 25, 2008 4:15 am US/Central
Bomb Blast Kills Lebanese Official In Beirut
BEIRUT, Lebanon (CBS News) ―
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A Lebanese internal security policeman inspects the scene of a blast that shook a Christian suburb of Beirut on Jan. 25, 2008.
AFP/Getty Images
A car bomb exploded in a Christian neighborhood of Beirut on Friday, killing a top police official and at least four others, authorities said.
National police chief, Brig. Gen. Ashraf Rifi, confirmed that the blast was a car bomb planted on a street in Hazmieh, on the Lebanese capital's Christian eastern edge.
He told reporters that one of those killed was Capt. Wissam Eid, a senior police intelligence official. Eid was an engineer who was handling "very important" files, including "all those having to do with the terrorist bombings" in Lebanon, Rifi said.
The police intelligence department is close to the Lebanese government's anti-Syrian majority, and has been frequently criticized by the pro-Syrian opposition.
Eid's bodyguard also was killed, Rifi said, in addition to three or four civilians.
The Lebanese Red Cross said four people were killed and 20 wounded, the state-run National News Agency said.
Arabic television stations reported that as many as 11 people had been killed by the blast. The reports could not be immediately confirmed, and other news organizations gave varying death tolls.
According to al-Arabiya, Eid, a senior member of the Internal Intelligence Services, was on his way back from a meeting with the International United Nations Committee investigating the assassination of the late Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri when his vehicle was targeted.
The blast hit a street in Hazmieh, on the Christian eastern edge of the capital. Video from the scene showed a huge plume of black smoke rising from street and orange flames shooting up into the sky.
Several cars could be seen burning in a blackened area some 20 yards wide, near a highway overpass. Firefighters struggled to put out the flames.
There was no official word on casualties, but TV footage showed a body slumped behind the wheel of a delivery truck that was ripped apart by the force of the explosion.
It was not immediately known whether the explosion was placed on the side of the road or whether it was packed in a car, nor what was the target.
Lebanon has been hit by a series of explosions, some of them political assassinations, amid a deepening 14-month political crisis. The explosion came a day after a labor strike that was largely peaceful, and 10 days after a car bomb aimed at a U.S. Embassy car killed three bystanders.
An explosion on Jan. 15 targeted a U.S. Embassy vehicle in northern Beirut, killing four Lebanese and injuring a local embassy employee just ahead of a farewell reception for the American ambassador.
The State Department said that one private American citizen was slightly wounded in that blast. The U.S. withdrew all diplomats from Beirut in September 1989 and did not reopen its embassy until 1991.
A previous car bombing on Dec. 12 in Beirut's suburb of Baabda killed Lebanese army Maj. Gen. Francois Hajj and two other people.
(© 2009 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)
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