Syria bus blast kills 3, terrorism ruled out
Map
DAMASCUS — A powerful blast wrecked an Iranian pilgrim bus near a Shiite shrine in Damascus on Thursday, killing three people in an incident Syria said was caused by a tyre blow-out and not a terrorist attack.
"It is not a terrorist act at all," Interior Minister Saeed Sammur told journalists at the scene of the explosion, a petrol station, where the mangled remains of the yellow Scania bus could still be seen.
"It happened while one of the empty bus's tyres was being repaired. An explosion took place as result of the excessive pressure.
"Two workers who were repairing the tyre and the bus's driver, who was standing near them, were killed in the explosion."
The minister said that, aside from the fatalities, there were no other casualties. No pilgrims were aboard the bus at the time of the blast.
Mohammed Issa, director of the Khomeini Hospital in Sayeda Zeinab, said one of the dead was a 12-year-old boy who worked at the petrol station where the tyre was being repaired.
Regional television channels had variously reported that the blast was caused by a bomb or an exploding gas cylinder packed in with the luggage of the pilgrims and had caused dozens of casualties.
Speculation centred on a possible terrorist attack, as the incident coincided with a visit to Damascus by Saeed Jalili, Tehran's chief nuclear negotiator and secretary of Iran's Supreme National Security Council.
The right rear side of the bus was severely damaged.
A chunk of the bus nearly the height of a man and somewhat longer was missing, and what was left just below the shattered windows was badly mangled.
Exposed parts of the chassis also appeared to be charred by fire.
The engine compartment at the rear of the bus was severely damaged.
The minister did not say whether the explosion of the tyre might have set off a secondary blast that caused the damage to the bus.
Bomb attacks are rare in Syria, a country known for its iron-fisted security.
The explosion happened near a Shiite shrine in the Sayeda Zeinab district that was the destination of the pilgrims. In September 2008, a car bomb there killed 17 people and wounded 14 in the deadliest such attack in more than a decade.
An AFP photographer said the explosion, which occurred around 8:30 am (0630 GMT), scattered debris over a radius of a dozen metres (yards).
The service station was about 500 metres from the shrine of Zeinab, who was the daughter of Shiite martyr Ali and granddaughter of the Muslim Prophet Mohammed.
The shrine draws tens of thousands of people from Iran, Iraq and Lebanon each year, and the bus was bringing pilgrims from the northwestern Iranian city Ardebil.
Comments