Blast strikes Christian sector of Beirut
Reports show fire, smoke, structural damage
 |  Officials believe the blast was caused by a car bomb. |
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 U.N. report on Hariri's death criticizes Syrian security forces.
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BEIRUT, Lebanon (CNN) -- A blast rocked Beirut on Saturday night, and Lebanese television broadcast stark images of severely damaged structures engulfed in flames.
Security officials reportedly think a car bomb caused the blast.
Casualties cannot yet be confirmed in the blast, which is said to have occurred in eastern Beirut, a predominantly Christian area.
Ambulances raced to the scene, reportedly in an industrial district, but it is not known whether people were trapped in the buildings.
A print shop and possibly a timber yard were said to be affected, which would account for the extensive flames and smoke.
News footage showed firefighters attempting to extinguish the fierce flames, which were shooting out of many windows.
The explosion was the latest in a series of blasts in the Christian areas of Lebanon. It occurred on the eve of the Christian holy day of Easter.
Four days ago, a bomb ripped through a shopping mall in a predominantly Christian area north of Beirut, killing three people and wounding at least two others, police said.
Just a few days earlier, a car bomb exploded in another Christian area of Beirut, shearing off part of a multistory office building. Nobody was killed.
The Lebanese capital had been relatively peaceful since the 1975-1990 civil war.
But the assassination last month of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri has generated popular anger at Syria, which many think was behind his killing, and instability has re-emerged.
There have been large demonstrations against Syria's troop presence in Lebanon, and Prime Minister Omar Karami's government resigned.
Karami stepped down February 28 under intense pressure. But he was reappointed by parliament to bring together opposition and loyalist politicians in a Cabinet to lead Lebanon to general elections scheduled for May.
Syria began pulling its 14,000 troops to the Bekaa Valley near the border March 8, and vowed to bring all the troops and intelligence officials across the border into Syria.
A fact-finding team investigating Hariri's assassination has blamed Syria's government for the political tension that preceded the killing, according to a U.N. report released last week.
According to the report, the specific causes for the assassination will not be known until after the killers are brought to justice.
"However, it is clear that the assassination took place in a political and security context marked by an acute polarization around the Syrian influence in Lebanon and a failure of the Lebanese state to provide adequate protection for its citizens," investigators concluded.
The report called Lebanon's security services "negligent" and accused them of contributing to the "propagation of a culture of intimidation and impunity."
The 15-year civil war mostly pitted Lebanon's ruling conservative Christians against leftist Muslims, with Syria, Israel and Western international forces -- including U.S. Marines -- occasionally taking part.
The treaty that ended the fighting revised the constitution to give the Muslim majority a greater role. The presidency, chosen by parliament, goes to a Christian. The prime minister must be a Sunni Muslim.
CNN's Brent Sadler contributed to this report
