Arms smuggler killed in mysterious car blast; Sudanese foreign minister: Explosion similar to past Israeli attacks

One person was killed when a car exploded in the eastern Sudanese city of Port Sudan on Tuesday, residents and state media said.

Later, Sudan´s foreign minister blamed Israel for the blast, which apparently targeted an arms smuggler.

Minister Ali Karti said the blast was similar to previous Israeli attacks on smugglers near the Red Sea.

"The Zionist entity imagines that Sudan supports some of the Palestinian factions," he told al-Shuruq channel. Sky News in Arabic quoted eyewitnesses who claimed that a pit was discovered at the site of the blast, possibly indicating an airstrike.

Earlier, state news agency SUNA, showing a picture of the damaged front of the car, gave no reason for the explosion at the Red Sea port.

SUNA said the dead driver was trader Nasser Awadallah Ahmed Said, 65. A Port Sudan resident said he belonged to the Ababda tribe, known for smuggling goods into Egypt.

East Sudan has long been a route for arms smuggling, often through Egypt´s Sinai desert into the Gaza Strip, the Palestinian territory run by Hamas Islamists.

Government officials contacted by Reuters declined to comment, saying the incident was under investigation.

In April 2011, Sudan said two people were killed in Port Sudan in a missile strike that Khartoum blamed on Israel, which declined to comment then.

Israel neither admitted nor denied a similar attack in eastern Sudan in 2009. (Copyright 2012 © Yedioth Internet 05/22/12)