Syria: Double bomb attack near the hotel where Macron spent the night, 18 injured

Two bomb attacks occurred Tuesday morning near the hotel where French President Emmanuel Macron spent the night in central Damascus, injuring 18 people according to Syrian authorities.

The Elysée Palace has assured that the head of state is continuing his visit to Syria as normal.

He had left the Four Seasons Hotel when the two explosions occurred. He was at the presidential palace mid-day for an expanded meeting between the French and Syrian leaders and their delegations, which was to be followed by a one-on-one meeting with Ahmad al-Sharaa, according to the French presidency.

One of the "homemade" bombs was placed in a garbage bin and the other in a vehicle parked on the side of the road, the Interior Ministry said, reporting 18 injured, including four police officers.

"I saw three injured members of the security forces lying on the ground," Houmam Hammoud, a currency trader who witnessed the scene, told AFP.

According to a source from the Ministry of the Interior, quoted by the official Sana news agency, security forces discovered the bombs which exploded as they were attempting to dismantle them.

The explosions were not heard from the presidential motorcade, according to two AFP journalists who were part of it.

Other AFP journalists saw traces of blood on the sidewalk and metal fragments near the hotel. Across the street, windows of the Ministry of Tourism were shattered by the explosions.

Security forces are deployed in force at the scene and are preventing access to the press, while ambulances have headed towards the scene.

The French president had met earlier that morning with representatives of civil society at this hotel.

They were taken by hotel security to the garage as a precaution after the two explosions, one of the participants told AFP.

Emmanuel Macron arrived in Syria on Monday evening, the first visit by a leader of a Western power to the country since an Islamist coalition came to power.

On Monday evening, he had dinner with the Syrian president in a restaurant in the center of Damascus before going with him to the famous Umayyad Mosque in the heart of the city.

His visit came as ten people were killed Thursday in a bomb attack on a cafe in central Damascus.