DAMASCUS, (SANA)- The General Command of the Army and the Armed Forces said that the terrorist explosion which targeted the National Security headquarters in Damascus on Wednesday morning while a meeting of a number of ministers and senior security officials was taking place is a new criminal escalation carried out by the hireling tools that are implementing foreign plots.
A statement by the General Command mentioned that Deputy Commander-in-Chief of the Army and the Armed Forces, Minister of Defense Gen. Dawood Abdullah Rajiha and Deputy Minister of Defense Gen. Asef Shawkat were martyred in the explosion and other attendees were injured.
While paying tribute to its heroic martyrs, the General Command of the Army and the Armed Forces stresses resolution to decisively eliminating the criminal and murder gangs and chasing them out of their rotten hideouts wherever they are until clearing the homeland of their evils," the statement said.
It added that whoever thinks that by targeting some leaders they could twist Syria's arms is "deluded", affirming that "Syria, people, army and leadership, is today more determined to counter terrorism with all its forms and cutting off the hand of whoever thinks to harm Syria's security."
http://www.sana.sy/eng/21/2012/07/18/432230.htm