BENGHAZI —  A car bomb damaged a Libyan foreign ministry building in Benghazi on Wednesday, Sept. 11, the first anniversary of the attack on the U.S. consulate in the country’s second largest city.

Two years after the revolt that toppled Muammar Gaddafi, Libya is riven along regional and tribal lines and dogged by armed violence, leaving the central government struggling to curb the clout of rival militias and radical Islamists.

People stand near a Libyan Foreign Ministry building in Benghazi after an explosion in Benghazi Sept.11, 2013. Credit REUTERS

Local security officials said a car packed with explosives was left beside the ministry building where it detonated at dawn, badly damaging it and several other buildings in the center of Benghazi. There were no reports of casualties.

A few hours before the Benghazi explosion, security forces defused a large bomb placed near the foreign ministry headquarters in the eastern Zawyat al Dahmani district of the capital Tripoli, the government said.

“Libyans cannot ignore the timing of this explosion. It’s a clear message by the forces of terror that they do not want the state or the army to stand on its feet,” Prime Minister Ali Zeidan told reporters.

Zeidan did not directly blame any group for the attack, but alluded to Islamist militants blamed for a spate of recent car bombs targeting security and army officers.