Lebanon bomb kills senior army officer, 4 others

BEIRUT, Dec 12 (Reuters) - A suspected car bomb in a Lebanese Christian town east of Beirut killed a senior army officer and at least four other people on Wednesday, security sources said.

Dozens were wounded in the blast in Baabda, the site of the country's presidential palace on the outskirts of the capital.

The sources said Brigadier General Francois al-Hajj, head of operations, was killed. Hajj was tipped to be the next army chief after current commander General Michel Suleiman takes over as president.

A military spokesman could neither confirm or deny that Hajj had died but said the explosion killed military personnel.

"All those killed were soldiers," he said.

The 7 a.m. (0500 GMT) blast hurled Hajj's car off the road and set several other vehicles ablaze. Several buildings nearby were damaged.

Scores of soldiers cordoned off the area as firefighters and rescue workers put out the fires and rushed the wounded to nearby hospitals.

On Monday, Lebanon's parliament speaker postponed a presidential election to Dec. 17, the 8th delay of a vote repeatedly put off over differences between the anti-Syrian governing coalition and the opposition backed by Damascus.

The feuding camps agreed last week on Suleiman, a Maronite Christian, as a consensus candidate for the post, which has been vacant since the term of Emile Lahoud ended on Nov. 23.

Electing Suleiman would ease Lebanon's worst political crisis since the 1975-1990 civil war. His nomination followed intense French-led mediation to resolve the crisis.

Arab and Western states have expressed concern that a prolonged vacuum in the presidency could further destabilise Lebanon, which has seen some sporadic deadly sectarian clashes earlier this year.

Lebanon has also seen several assassinations of anti-Syrian figures since the killing of former prime minister Rafik al-Hariri in February 2005. Most recently Christian lawmaker Antoine Ghanem was killed in a car bomb attack in September.

(Additional reporting by Laila Bassam and Mohammad Azakir; Writing by Yara Bayoumy, by Michael Winfrey)