A bomb attached to a diesel tanker truck exploded next to a hotel used by United Nations staffers in central Damascus on Wednesday, injuring three people and causing minor damage to surrounding buildings, Washington Post reports.
The blast site is also close to a club for military officers and the Ministry of Defense. The rebel Free Syrian Army claimed it carried out the attack but said the target was the Syrian security forces, not the U.N. monitors, according to al-Jazeera.
“The operation was targeting the central security command in response to murders perpetrated by the security forces nationwide,” an FSA commander named Abu al-Noor told the network in a phone interview.
Faisal Mekdad, the deputy foreign minister, visited the area and said that no U.N. staffers were injured in the attack.
“This is another criminal operation which proves the [extent of the] attack which Syria has been exposed to and the criminal and barbaric nature of those who carry out these attacks — and their backers in Syria and abroad,” Mekdad said at the site, according to Reuters news agency.