'Young girl' detonates suicide bomb in Damascus police station

A young nine-year-old girl blew herself up in a police station in the Midan neighborhood of Damascus on Friday, according to state news.

An explosion rocked the southeastern neighbourhood of Syria's capital, with state-run Ikhbariya news channel showing blurred images of what looked like a blackened girl's head in a blanket, and scenes of destruction inside what it claimed was a police station.

"A seven-year-old girl entered the police station, carrying a belt that was detonated from afar," the Al-Watan daily posted on its Facebook page.

The news was confirmed by London-based monitor the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

According to a witness, a young girl entered the police station and, after asking to go to the toilet, blew herself up, Reuters reported.

Although rebel groups have fired rockets and mortar rounds into the capital, explosions inside the city itself are rare.

In early 2012, a suicide bomber killed 26 people when he blew himself up in Midan.

However, at least four people were killed in a bomb blast near a Syrian Arab Red Crescent centre in the regime-held city of Homs in central Syria on Thursday.

State television reported the attack in the Zahraa neighbourhood, a majority Alawite area, the religious sect to which President Bashar al-Assad belongs.

"A bomb exploded near a Red Cross centre in the Zahraa neighbourhood," a breaking news alert said.

"Four civilians were killed and others wounded, some of them seriously," it added.

The neighbourhood has frequently been targeted in blasts during Syria's six-year conflict. 

In September, four people were killed in an explosion at the entrance to Zahraa that was claimed by the Islamic State group.

The hardline militant group also claimed a double bomb attack in the neighbourhood in February that killed 57 people.

Syria's government controls all but one neighbourhood in Homs city, as well as much of the surrounding province.

More than 310,000 people have died since Syria's conflict broke out in 2011.