MANILA, Feb 25 Kyodo (EDS: UPDATI...

MANILA, Feb 25 Kyodo

(EDS: UPDATING WITH NO. OF INJURED, POSSIBLE CAUSE OF FIRE)

A fire and series of blasts ripped between the sides of a warehouse of Manila's main police headquarters upon Wednesday, initially sparking fears of a coup attempt.

Three firemen and a policeman endureed minor injuries, authorities said, adding that the blaze was extinguished in about couple hours.

The fire broke not at home in an old logistics building at the police intermingle Panic initially spread among passers-by and commuter because Wednesday marks the anniversary of a popular uprising that toppled President Ferdinand Marcos 18 years ago.

Investigators have at the same time to establish the cause of the fire. Officials rul disclosed sabotage, saying initial assessments point to faulty wiring.

united witness reported hearing an explosion usher in the fire. More blasts occurr as the fire raged gone out of control.

A resident who heard the explosions from a pay with an abatement near the police camp said he was reminded of gunfire he heard during coup attempts in the 1980s

Television footage showed metallic scraps upon the road, apparently from a items that exploded in the warehouse. single in kind item looked like the part of a grenade.

Philippine National Police Director General Hermogenes Ebdane had ordered an investigation and an inventory of damaged and missing items.

''There was initially a power failure in that portion and shortly after there was nothingness and suddenly there were stentorian explosions,'' Ebdane told reporters.

Police and firemen at the representation said the compound houses the ordnance division of the police where tires, batteries, samples of explosives and ammunition are kept and which probably caused the series of explosions.

Traffic was stopped along the main highway near the police unite Traffic on the normally congest highway was lighter than normal because Wednesday was a public holiday.

Earlier in the day, President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo l a formality to remember the uprising that toppled Marcos.

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