BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) - A huge explosion believed caused by a car bomb rocked central Baghdad on Sunday near the Baghdad Hotel, which is thought to be an office of the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency in the Iraqi capital.
A U.S. soldier who would give his name said as many as 14 people were either injured or killed. An Associated Press reporter at the scene saw one dead body being taken away.
The hotel is believed to hold CIA operations. However, a U.S. government official in Washington, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said the building was not the CIA's headquarters in Baghdad.
It was the second big car bombing in the capital in the past four days. A suicide bomber hit a police station in the northeast Shiite Muslim slum known as Sadr City on Thursday, killing at least 10 people, including the bomber.
A bystander in Sunday's blast, Hamid Rahim, 22, said he saw about a half-dozen injured taken away in police cars.
Two huge blasts could be heard in quick succession, although it was not clear if two cars were involved.
Saad Hamid, 41, a shopkeeper about a block away, said police caught a car bomber at the same spot six weeks ago before he could detonate his explosive. Authorities then erected a blast wall at the end of the street. The force of the explosion Sunday blew over at least one section of the blast wall.
Bricks were hurled to the third floor of nearby buildings.
Sevan Armin, 33, said a car approached the Baghdad Hotel on the wrong side of the street. "It was traveling at high speed. The guards at the gate fired on it. The car hit the concrete blast barrier and exploded." Armin had a minor head injury.
Sabah Ulam, 37, was in a car right behind one that exploded. He described it as a Toyota Corolla and said it turned suddenly toward the hotel.
"I saw the driver; he was not an Iraqi, he had a lighter complexion," Ulam said. "He did not have a beard and was wearing a hat. We were protected by the wall. A policeman shot at him four times, and then there was the explosion."
Rahim said two cars tried to enter a sidestreet leading from Saadoun Street to the Baghdad Hotel, but both exploded. Windows were blown out as far as two blocks from the explosion. The car or cars that blew up had gotten to within about 70 yards of their apparent target.
Rahim and hotel co-worker Karim Abdel al-Hussein, 23, both said two cars approached the barricaded street at high speed and one or both got behind the sidestreet barricade. They believe both exploded before reaching the hotel.
Ambulances and police vehicles rushed to the scene as U.S. helicopters circled overhead.
Associated Press Television News footage showed U.S. troops ordering people away from the bombing site. Firefighters sprayed water on piles of burning rubble.
The blast rattled windows in the Palestine Hotel, home to many foreign journalists covering the aftermath of the U.S.-led war in Iraq.