A car packed with at least 110 pounds (50 kilograms) of explosives blew up in an office district of Colombia's capital Thursday, shattering windows in dozens of buildings and injuring nine people, police said. No deaths were reported.
It was the first car bombing in Bogota since a blast killed two people a year and a half ago, and came five days after Juan Manuel Santos was sworn in as president.
The blast occurred at 5:30 a.m. outside a 12-story building housing Caracol Radio, the Spanish news agency EFE and the Ecuadorean consulate, as well as the offices of several banks and politicians, including former President Cesar Gaviria.
Investigators were not sure of the target or who was behind the bombing, said Hermes Ardila, chief of prosecutors in a special anti-terrorism unit. He said by telephone eight hours after the bombing that investigators had not linked the attack to any particular armed group.
The president hurried to the scene and called the explosion "a terrorist act," saying it was meant to sow fear and create skepticism about the government.
"We are going to continue fighting terrorism with everything we have," said Santos, who took office Saturday. He replaced Alvaro Uribe, whose tough tactics sharply weakened the leftist guerrilla groups that have fought the government for decades.
Santos toured the blast site surrounded by security agents and urged Colombians to go on with normal activities.
Bogota's health secretary, Hector Zambrano, said at least nine people were injured. Most were treated for cuts and released, but three people remained under care, he said.
Pinzon said most of those hurt had been on a bus that was passing by as the bomb exploded. Authorities said no arrests had been made.
The national police operations director, Gen. Orlando Paez, said the car was packed with at least 110 pounds (50 kilograms) of explosives and the blast shattered windows in at least 30 buildings, smashed the facade of a bank and left scraps of the destroyed car scattered in the street.
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