Bomb wounds two U.N. peacekeepers in Lebanon

BEIRUT (Reuters) - Two U.N. peacekeeping soldiers were slightly wounded when their vehicle hit a roadside bomb in south Lebanon on Tuesday, a spokesman for the United Nations force said.

The spokesman did not give the nationality of the wounded soldiers. Lebanese security sources said they were Irish.

The blast smashed the windows of a white U.N. four-wheel-drive vehicle near Rmaileh village, 35 km south of Beirut and not far from the sprawling Ain al-Hilweh Palestinian refugee camp, a hotbed for Islamist militant groups.

It was the third attack on the 13,500-strong force known as UNIFIL since it was expanded after a 34-day war between Israel and Lebanese Hezbollah guerrillas ended in August 2006.

Three Spanish and three Colombian U.N. soldiers were killed when a bomb destroyed their armoured troop carrier in the first attack, on June 24 last year.

In July, a bomb exploded near a UNIFIL position, causing no casualties. Lebanese authorities have charged six Palestinians, three of them in absentia, in relation to that blast.

Tuesday's attack occurred hours after Israel said two rockets fired from Lebanon overnight had exploded in the northern border village of Shlomi, inflicting no casualties.

Israel, which came under Hezbollah rocket barrages during the 2006 war, is on high alert ahead of a visit by U.S. President George W. Bush that begins on Wednesday.

Several Palestinian militant groups have a presence in Lebanon and have at times launched attacks across the border.