Seven-year-old girl turned into bomb

A seven-year-old girl calmly walked into a Damascus police station before blowing herself up, Syrian media has reported. The explosion in the bustling Midan neighbourhood of the Syrian capital wounded three police officers, said the Al-Watan daily, which is close to the government.

'A seven-year-old girl entered the police station, carrying a belt that was detonated from afar,' the paper posted on its Facebook page.

A police source told Al-Watan that the little girl had appeared lost and asked to use the bathroom when the explosives went off.

A clip filmed at the scene of the incident, in the centre of Damascus, shows parts of the building reduced to rubble in the blast.

At one stage in the report, the camera shows the child's remains, which have been blurred out.

The girl's explosive device was reportedly detonated by her handlers, who were outside the building at the time.

Although rebel groups have fired rockets and mortar rounds into the capital, explosions inside the city itself are rare.

Syrian state news agency SANA said earlier there were preliminary reports about a 'terrorist explosion at the Midan police station in Damascus', while the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights confirmed there had been a blast in Midan but said it could not specify the cause.

Observatory head Rami Abdel Rahman told AFP that 'one woman' was killed in the blast, but it remained unclear whether she was a suicide bomber or a bystander.

The horror incident comes as children in besieged city of Aleppo were reportedly burned alive in violent clashes as President Bashar al-Assad’s forces closed in.

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