Lebanese minister hit by car bomb
A car bomb hit the motorcade of Lebanon's outgoing deputy prime minister in Beirut today, wounding him and killing at least one other person, police said.
Elias Murr, who is also the caretaker defence minister, was slightly wounded in the explosion, a police officer at the scene said. It was the latest in a string five bombings in Lebanon this year, but the first attack targeting a pro-Syrian politician.
The Lebanese national news agency said one person was killed, but Reuters reported that security officials put the death toll at two.
Five people were injured in the mid-morning blast, which also damaged nearby cars and buildings in the northern district of Naqash.
Police said explosives packed in a car were detonated as Mr Murr's motorcade passed, leaving a two metre-wide crater in the pavement and flinging the booby-trapped vehicle over the wall of an adjacent villa.
Other recent attacks and bombings have targeted opponents of Damascus and were blamed by Lebanon's anti-Syrian groups on the Syrian government and its allies in the Lebanese intelligence services.
In October, the former economy minister Marwan Hamadeh survived a car bomb explosion with serious injuries and, in February, former prime minister Rafik Hariri was killed with 20 others in a Beirut car bombing. Hariri's assassination led to mass anti-Syrian protests and intensified international pressure that forced Syria to withdraw its army from Lebanon in April.
Anti-Syrian journalist Samir Kassir was killed by a bomb placed under his car on June 2, and former Communist party leader George Hawi was killed in a similar fashion on June 21.
Although Mr Murr is regarded as pro-Syrian, his father has forged a political alliance with Michel Aoun, a Christian former general who returned in May after 14 years in forced exile for leading a revolt against the Syrian military presence.
Mr Aoun and his supporters won 21 seats in Lebanon's recent parliamentary election, the first since the Syrian pullout.
Today's explosion came as Lebanon's prime minister designate, Fouad Siniora, continued his efforts to form the country's first government since the Syrian withdrawal. Mr Murr's name reportedly figured prominently in the line-up for the new cabinet.