Bombs Explode at U.S., British Offices in Italy

A car bomb shattered windows and set fire to parked cars near the U.S. Embassy today, and bombs exploded on the grounds of the U.S. and British embassies. An anonymous caller linked the attacks to the seven-power summit in Venice.

A woman who was near the car that blew up was hospitalized for shock, police said. There were no other reported injuries.

A caller to a news service in London claimed that the attacks were the work of the Anti-Imperialist International Brigade. The man, who spoke English with a slight accent, said the bombings proved “that the revolutionary will is stronger than the high security measures taken for the protection of the so-called seven giants of the world.”

Two hours before the bombings, frogmen retrieved what police at first said was a mine from a lagoon in Venice. However, police later said the object was a water heater.

The three explosions in the Italian capital occurred within half an hour of each other, starting shortly after 7 a.m. The car bomb exploded about 7:45 a.m., turning a parked, unoccupied silver gray Ford Sierra into twisted mass of metal.

‘Crude but Well-Made’

A police bomb expert said four “crude but well-made” explosive devices were launched from a hotel across the street from the U.S. Embassy on Via Veneto.

Police spokesman Riccardo Infelisi said that two of the devices landed inside the embassy gates but that only one exploded. The other two did not blow up and landed just outside the Hotel Ambasciatori, from which they apparently were launched, officers said.

Police said officers who entered a fifth-floor room of the hotel found a rifle equipped to fire small bombs. Infelisi said the room had been rented to a man of Asian origin with a Canadian passport. The man was not in the room when police entered.

Michael Hague, an attache at the British Embassy, said a bomb was thrown over the iron fence of the compound about 7:05 a.m. and exploded harmlessly in an ornamental pool filled with three feet of water.