A powerful car bomb exploded near a security complex in the Syrian capital Damascus this morning, killing 17 civilians in what the interior minister said was a terrorist attack.
The bombing, on the road to the city's main airport, was the third major attack in the tightly-controlled country this year.
State television said the car was rigged with 200 kgs of explosives, making it one of the biggest attacks in Damascus since a series of bombings in the early 1980s by Islamist militants.
There was no indication of who might have carried it out.
"This is definitely a terrorism attack that occurred in a crowded area. This is a cowardly attack," Interior Minister General Bassam Abdel Majeed told state television. He said 14 people were wounded in the attack, although witnesses said the number was much higher.
The blast occurred at a crowded intersection leading to the Sit Zeinab shrine, popular with Shi'ite pilgrims from Iran and Lebanon.
Security forces cordoned off the area but witnesses said the security centre's main building appeared to have suffered little damage.
Television showed smashed car windshields and shattered windows in nearby residential buildings and a large crater filled with water at the blast site. Some industrial buildings about 100 metres away were also damaged and the remains of the destroyed car were strewn on the highway, witnesses said.
"Smoke filled nearby buildings ... I rushed to the street and found a burning car, fire and smoke," one eye witness told state television.
Another said: "I was sleeping ... and then the doors came loose and I felt like I was in the street. Glass windows were destroyed and the ceiling's iron infrastructure was visible. We thought it was an earthquake."
US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice condemned the blast and said she had met Syria's foreign minister yesterday to discuss regional issues.
"I just learned this morning of the bombing in Syria. I don't think we know (who did it) ... Obviously any activity by extremists is concerning," Ms Rice told reporters at her New York hotel.
Ms Rice said she had a 10-15 minute meeting with Syrian foreign minister Walid al-Moualem on the sidelines of an Iftar dinner at the UN General Assembly last night where they discussed regional issues.
"It was just to talk a bit about the regional situation and some of the emerging efforts there. He was at the Iftar," said Ms Rice, without giving further details of their discussion.
Syria has been involved in indirect peace talks with Israel, with Turkish mediation, and Ms Rice expressed US support for those talks, reiterating the United States was ready to help when needed.
"The United States has always said that at the time that it would be helpful, the United States would of course be willing to play a role," she said.
"We recognise that comprehensive peace has to have movement along all tracks, but of course our focus is on the Palestinian-Israeli track because we believe that that is the one that is most mature."
The United States is mediating Palestinian statehood talks and hopes to have a deal between the Israelis and the Palestinians before the end of the year, although hopes are dimming for that.
The Israelis and the Syrians have already held four rounds of indirect talks which focus on the fate of the Golan Heights, a strategic plateau which Israel captured from Syria in the 1967 Middle East war. Damascus demands the return of all the Golan.
Israel, in turn, wants Syria to scale back ties with its main foes - Iran and the Palestinian Hamas and Lebanese Hezbollah militants groups. Syria has so far refused to do so.
State Department spokesman Gordon Duguid said no Americans were injured or killed in the car bomb but that in light of heightened security concerns, the US Embassy's consular section would be closed for all but "emergency services" for US citizens.
Syrian authorities pride themselves on maintaining stability in the country of 19 million people by cracking down on dissent and opposition but their control has been challenged by a series of violent events.
The attack was the first explosion in Damascus since the car bomb assassination of Imad Moughniyah, military commander of the Lebanese Islamist group Hezbollah, in February. Hezbollah blames Israel for that attack although Israel denies it.
Last month, a senior security commander who was the International Atomic Energy Agency's main Syrian contact was shot dead at a beach resort near the port of Tartous in mysterious circumstances.
The country has also witnessed violence by Muslim militants in recent years with security forces clashing with militant groups on some occasions. In September 2006, four Syrians tried to storm the US embassy in Damascus in a bold attack in which four assailants and a Syrian guard were killed.
Syria has been ruled by the Baath party since it took power in a coup in 1963 and banned all opposition. The security apparatus is key to Syria's support for Hezbollah, which fought a war with Israel in 2006 and wields huge influence on government.
The country is also home to the Palestinian Islamist group's Hamas leadership and is under pressure to scale back links with the group, Iran, and Hezbollah in recent indirect peace talk rounds with Israel.
The US-backed Iraqi government is also pushing Damascus to stop anti-US rebels from infiltrating over the border.
Reuters