New Straits Times, Malaysia
March 19 2005

Eight injured, extensive damage in Beirut car bomb blast: police

Eight people were slightly injured and extensive damage caused when a
car bomb exploded in a northern Beirut suburb, police said.
Eight people were slightly injured and extensive damage caused when a
car bomb exploded in a northern Beirut suburb, police said.
“The Japanese-made Datsun car belonged to an Armenian living in the
building in front of which the explosion took place. The explosive
was placed under his vehicle,” a police spokesman told AFP.
Live footage on Lebanese television station LBCI showed the blast had
caused extensive damage in the residential neighbourhood of Jdeide,
along a coastal road.

Several buildings were damaged and cars parked in the street where
the explosion took place were destroyed.

Police had sealed off the neighbourhood. The blast, which could be
heard in central Beirut, brought many people out into the street who
had been woken from their sleep.

The explosion happened shortly after midnight (2230 GMT Friday), just
over a month after the assassination of former prime minister Rafiq
Hariri threw Lebanon into a political crisis.