A car bomb exploded Wednesday outside EITB-Basque public radio and television station, located in Bilbao, following a warning call from the Basque armed group ETA.

The blast caused significant damage but no injuries. Police said the bomb exploded shortly after 11 a.m. (1000 GMT) outside the offices of the EITB headquarters. The building had been evacuated and the area cordoned off to traffic following a warning call to a fire department about an hour before the explosion. "I still don''t know how to react. What a way to end the year," EITB
presenter Begoña Zubieta, who was among several hundred people evacuated, told The Associated Press in a mobile phone message.

Other television stations broadcasted footage showing the explosion. After a flash of fire, the blast blew out dozens of windows on the glass facade of the six-story building. Then a large plume of thick smoke rose up and partially obscured the building.

The attack came less than a month after the fatal shooting of a Basque businessman Inazio Uria in Azpeitia, Gipuzkoa, on Dec. 3