Powerful Blast Rocks Baghdad Suburb

25/12/2004| IslamWeb

A gas tanker truck wired with explosives has detonated in a west Baghdad neighbourhood killing up to eight people and injuring 20 others. More casualties were feared from the explosion on Friday night which lit the night sky and sent columns of smoke over the al-Mansur district, an area which houses the Jordanian and Libyan embassies. Residents said they could hear small-arms fire immediately after the blast. A doctor at Baghdad's al-Yarmuk hospital said most of the casualties suffered second-degree burns. Several had been sent to burns centres at other hospitals. Baghdad-based Iraqi journalist Ziyad al-Samarrai told Aljazeera the initial casualty toll reported by local police - 13 - was likely to be inaccurate as hospitals were still receiving the injured. Aljazeera learned that the blast originated in al-Amirat street, where several embassies and houses of Iraqi officials are located. More than 15 homes in the vicinity as well as vehicles were set ablaze. **Investigation*** "The smell of explosives is hanging over the whole area," a resident said. The US military said it was investigating the explosion. Jordanian diplomats moved into a three-villa complex on the street after their main building in another part of the city was targeted by a car bomb last year. The former Jordanian embassy building in Baghdad was attacked in a bomb blast in August last year, killing at least seven people. No group has come forward yet to say it carried out the attack. **PHOTO CAPTION*** Security guards stand by debris that fell on the Lybian Embassy in Baghdad's Mansour district Saturday Dec 25 2004. (AP)