BEIRUT, Dec 12: A car bomb blast killed Lebanese newspaper magnate and anti-Syrian lawmaker Gebran Tueni in Beirut on Monday, a day after he returned from Paris, where he had based himself in recent months in fear of assassination.

Several Lebanese politicians immediately pointed the finger at Syria, but Damascus quickly denied involvement and said the killing was timed to smear it.

Police said Tueni, publisher of An-Nahar daily, was among four people killed in the explosion that destroyed his armoured sports utility vehicle as it was driving in the Mekalis area of mainly Christian east Beirut. Some 32 people were wounded.

The bodies of Tueni, 48, his driver and a bodyguard were found in the car, charred beyond recognition. Assault rifles and military bags laid beside them inside the wrecked vehicle.

Immediately after the killing, a previously unknown group claimed responsibility for the assassination of Tueni.

In a statement faxed to Reuters bearing no insignia or letterhead, the group calling itself “Strugglers for the Unity and Freedom of the Levant”, said the same fate awaited other opponents of “Arabism” in Lebanon.

Tueni was killed just hours before the UN Security Council was due to receive a report by chief UN investigator Detlev Mehlis, who has been trying to identify those behind the Feb 14 assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik al-Hariri.

An interim report by Mehlis in October said the evidence pointed towards the involvement of Syrian officials and their Lebanese allies in Hariri’s killing. Syria denies this.

Syria condemned the latest attack in Lebanon.—Reuters