A car bomb exploded near a police station in the Jubar district of Damascus today killing at least eight Syrian security forces as fighting raged between rebels and regime forces, a watchdog said.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the explosion, in the east of the capital, appeared to have been carried out by the extremist Al-Nusra Front, which is allied with Al-Qaeda, although there was no immediate confirmation.
"At least eight regime forces were killed, and a number of civilians injured, after a large explosion caused by a car bomb hit the Jubar neighbourhood near a police station," Observatory director Rami Abdel Rahman told AFP.
There was no immediate information on the attack on Syrian state media.
In a statement, the Observatory said fierce clashes between rebels and regime forces were ongoing in Jubar, a contested neighbourhood which has been targeted by regime air strikes and mortar attacks in the past few months.
Elsewhere in the capital, the Observatory said, regime forces shelled the Al-Hajar Al-Aswad, Assali and Qaddam neighbourhoods in the south and southwest of the city overnight.
