Twin blasts struck Syria's capital, Damascus, as the uprising against President Bashar al-Assad – and the government's brutal crackdown against it – enters its second year.

Syrian state television said what it called “terrorist attacks” Saturday morning killed police and civilians. It said preliminary reports traced the two explosions to car bombs targeting a security police building and a building housing intelligence services.

Television footage shows smoke billowing from the explosion site, twisted steel and debris strewn in front of a blasted-out building, and bloodstains on the ground, including a pool of blood under a mangled van.

The United Nations says well over 8,000 people have died since the uprising began a year ago Thursday. A spokesman for the secretary-general blamed the violence on the Syrian government's decision “to choose violent repression over peaceful political dialogue.”