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A senior Lebanese police intelligence officer and two others die in a bomb blast near a road overpass in a mainly Christian area of Beirut. Angry protesters in the dead man's hometown say the officer worked heroically for his country. A car bomb killed a Lebanese police intelligence officer and three other people when it tore through morning traffic in a Christian suburb of Beirut on Friday (January 25), police said. A police spokesman named the officer targeted in the blast as Captain Wisam Eid. A bodyguard was also killed and 30 people were wounded. Eid, 31, worked for an intelligence unit widely viewed as close to anti-Syrian ruling coalition leader Saad al-Hariri. The assassination was the latest in a wave of bombings and political killings in Lebanon over the past three years. The turmoil caused by the killings has fuelled the country's worst political crisis since the 1975-1990 civil war. The police intelligence unit has been closely involved in the U.N.-led investigation into the 2005 assassination of Hariri's father, former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik al-Hariri, and in a crackdown on al Qaeda-inspired militants. Interior Minister Hassan al-Sabaa said Eid had been targeted before. He took up his post after a roadside bomb wounded his predecessor, Samir Shehadeh, in 2006. The explosives-packed car was parked on the side of a road near an overpass in the suburb of Hazmiyeh. It was detonated by remote control as Eid's car drove by on his way to work, security sources said. Fire fighters sprayed water over blazing cars and smoking debris. A charred corpse was visible in one car. Body parts were strewn on the road. Dozens of vehicles were damaged in the blast, which ripped a large crater in the road. The attack occurred 10 days after a car bomb damaged a U.S. diplomatic car in Beirut, killing three people and wounding 16. Last month a car bomb killed the army's chief of operations, Brigadier-General Francois Haj, in east Beirut. The majority coalition accuses Syria of being behind the blast that killed Hariri and many of the 30 or more bombings that have hit Lebanon in the last three years, many targeting anti-Syrian politicians and journalists. Damascus denies any involvement in the attacks. Bombers have also targeted U.N. peacekeepers in the south, while a revolt by al Qaeda-inspired Islamist militants in the north last year further undermined Lebanon's stability. Apart from its security problems, Lebanon is in the thick of a long-running political conflict pitting the Western-backed ruling coalition against the Hezbollah-led opposition. The dispute has paralysed government for more than a year and blocked election of a new president, leaving Lebanon with no head of state for the first time since its 1975-90 civil war. Rival factions have agreed that army commander Michel Suleiman should be the next president, but remain at odds over how to share power in a future national unity government. Mediation by Arab League Secretary-General Amr Moussa has failed to bridge the gulf. He is due to report on his efforts to Arab foreign ministers meeting in Cairo on Sunday. Lebanese Sports Minister Ahmad Fatfat, who is allied to the anti-Syrian coalition, said Eid had been a valuable officer involved in the investigation of many of the bombings. He said those behind the killing would have been sending a 'message'. "It's a message to the international community and the Arab League that these forces won't be pressured to do things against their interests. It also comes unfortunately, directly, after some Syrian newspapers attacked the Arab League initiative and its chief Amr Moussa," Lebanese sports minister Ahmed Fatfat, who is allied to the anti-Syrian coalition, said. In Tripoli, Eid's hometown, angry residents burned tyres to protest his killing. "Today, we lost one of the best men in the country. He worked heroically for his country and he was targeted in a very malicious and ugly way," one unidentified man said.