UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, Valerie Amos, left, meets with Faisal Mekdad Syrian Ambassador to United Nations, during a press conference in Damascus, Syria, Tuesday, Aug. 14, 2012. The portrait shows Syrian President Bashar Assad. (AP Photo/Bassem Tellawi)
UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, Valerie Amos, left, meets with Faisal Mekdad Syrian Ambassador to United Nations, during a press conference in Damascus, Syria, Tuesday, Aug. 14, 2012. The portrait shows Syrian President Bashar Assad. (AP Photo/Bassem Tellawi)
DAMASCUS, Syria (AP) ? A bomb attached to a fuel truck exploded Wednesday outside a Damascus hotel where U.N. observers are staying in the Syrian capital, wounding at least three people, Syria's state TV reported.
The TV said the explosion took place near a parking lot used by the army command, which is about 300 meters (yards) away. None of the wounded were believed to be U.N. staff.
But according to an Associated Press reporter at the scene, the blast had gone off inside a different parking lot belonging to a military compound near the Dama Rose Hotel, popular with the U.N. observers in Syria.
The hotel was slightly damaged in the blast, with some of its windows shattered. A Labor Union building across from the hotel was also damaged and black smoke was seen billowing into the sky before the fire was extinguished.
U.N. officials in Damascus had no immediate comment when contacted by the AP.
Damascus has been hit by a wave of explosions in the past months and clashes between government troops and rebels have also recently reached the capital, which had been relatively quiet since an uprising against President Bashar Assad's regime started in March last year.
Activists say more than 20,000 people have been killed since then and the conflict has morphed into a full-out civil war.
"Those who carry out such terrorist attacks are destroying their country in order to get some pounds," shouted Ali Mohammed Ismail, 48, who said he happened to be in the area when the explosion occurred.
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