Mystery blast outside Indonesia embassy in Paris

PARIS: A bomb blast outside Indonesia’s embassy in Paris caused serious damage to surrounding buildings but no injuries, police said, as investigators sought a motive for the attack.

“It’s a small miracle that there were no victims,” a police source said yesterday.

The bomb exploded around 5.45am, when the streets of western Paris were relatively quiet, blowing out windows in a 50m radius and setting fire to two cars.

Police chief Michel Gaudin visited the scene after the blast, accompanied by his chief of staff, who said that a bag had been spotted under the embassy’s windows by a worker clearing bins in the street.

“He looked inside the bag, opened it and thought it must be a bomb since he saw a canister attached to wires.

“He dropped it, left the area and called the police. That’s when it exploded,” Jean-louis Fiamenghi said.

“No one was hurt but there are people in shock in neighbouring flats.”

Fiamenghi said the bomb could have contained “several kilos of explosives”.

No group or individual immediately claimed responsibility for the attack.

Police and firefighters were rushed to the area and sealed off the road where the blast occured. A bomb disposal team was also in place to make any remaining explosives safe.

“For now we are not ruling out any possibilities, we are just at the very beginning of the investigation, every theory needs to be studied,” a police source said.

Injakarta, officials said indonesia’s intelligence agency was working with French authorities to investigate, but that the motive for the bombing was not clear.

“We’re still looking for clarity on whether we were the target or not,” said Teuku Faizasyah, Indonesian presidential spokesman on foreign affairs.

“In the mid-2000s there was a case of a small bomb explosion at the Indonesian embassy in Paris. It turned out to be a local incident, and nothing to do with a national threat,” he added. — AFP