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Carine Torbey: "Explosion was so loud it resonated in different parts of the city"
The former Lebanese Finance Minister Mohamad Chatah has been assassinated in a big bomb blast in central Beirut.
He was an adviser to the former Prime Minister Saad Hariri, a Sunni Muslim.
Four others were also killed in the suspected car bombing near government offices and the parliament. At least 50 people were injured.
The Syrian war has increased Lebanon's Sunni-Shia tensions. Lebanon's Shia Hezbollah movement is helping Syria's President Bashar al-Assad.
President Assad comes from the Alawite sect, a heterodox offshoot of Shia Islam.
The Beirut blast damaged several buildings near the Phoenicia Hotel and set several cars ablaze.
Profile: Mohamad Chatah
- Former Lebanese ambassador to US
- Close aide to assassinated ex-PM Rafik Hariri
- Finance minister in government of Rafik Hariri's son, Saad, until Jan 2011
- Remained senior adviser to Saad Hariri
Reports say Mr Chatah's car was targeted as he was travelling to a meeting with his Sunni opposition parliamentary bloc.
Some of the Syrian rebel groups are affiliated with the Sunni Muslim al-Qaeda network.
Iran, which backs Hezbollah, saw its embassy in Beirut attacked last month.
Mr Chatah was a staunch critic of President Assad and Hezbollah.
'Terror and panic'In a Twitter message early on Friday, shortly before he was killed, Mr Chatah said Hezbollah was "pressing hard to be granted similar powers in security and foreign policy matters that Syria exercised in Lebanon for 15 years".
Recent deadly attacks in Lebanon
- 9 July: Car bomb wounds dozens in a Hezbollah stronghold in Beirut
- 15 Aug: Car bomb kills 27 people and injures hundreds more in a Shia area of south Beirut
- 23 Aug: More than 40 people killed and 400 injured in two blasts outside Sunni mosques in Tripoli
- 19 Nov: 22 killed and more than 140 injured in double suicide bombing outside Iranian embassy in Beirut
- 4 Dec: Hezbollah commander Hassan Lakkis shot dead in Hadath, near Beirut
Mr Chatah became finance minister in 2008. After Saad Hariri lost the premiership in early 2011 Mr Chatah served as his senior adviser.
Witnesses described shock and fear at the scene of the blast.
"We were opening our store when we heard the blast. It was really loud. We are used to blasts in Lebanon but not in this area. Now we are not safe anywhere," said a shop assistant quoted by AFP news agency, which named him simply as Mohammad.
A witness quoted by Reuters news agency said the explosion "caught motorists driving in the morning rush hour" and "there was terror and panic among residents".
"There was a big ball of fire and panic everywhere and then we learned that Chatah was the target," said the witness, Adel-Raouf Kneio.
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