Beirut suicide bomber kills Lebanese security officer late on Tuesday

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An overnight suicide blast in Beirut's southern suburbs, Hezbollah's main bastion, killed a security officer, who had tried to stop the bomber, the General Security agency said Tuesday. No one has claimed the attack, but an audio recording posted on YouTube by a Sunni militant group said there would be more "strikes" if the Shiite movement does not pull out of Syria.

The explosion happened around midnight (21:00 GMT Monday) near an army checkpoint and cafe where football fans were watching a World Cup match.
An army statement said a suicide attacker driving a white Mercedes "blew himself up at an army checkpoint at the Tayuneh roundabout (in southern Beirut), wounding several civilians."

The official National News Agency reported 12 people wounded.
On Tuesday, the General Security agency confirmed in a statement that Abdel Karim Hodroj, a 20-year-old inspector, had been killed, after carrying out DNA tests on his remains.
"The martyr Hodroj paid with his life for the mission he was entrusted with, in the national war against terror," said the agency.
A security source had earlier told AFP that Hodroj and his colleague Ali Jaber, who was wounded, "were passing through the area ... They felt a vehicle that was going against the traffic flow was suspicious.
"The vehicle stopped in the middle of the road, and a man got out. (Hodroj and his colleague) stopped him and questioned him. The man said his car key was broken, and he couldn't drive anymore," the source said.
The driver's suspicious behavior led Jaber to go to the nearby army checkpoint to report him.
"Hodroj remained with the suicide attacker to ensure he wouldn't get away," the security source said.
Jaber was 30 meters (yards) away when the explosion happened.