International: At least three were killed and more than a hundred injured after hand-held radios used by Lebanon's armed group Hezbollah detonated late on Wednesday afternoon across the country's south and in the southern suburbs of the capital Beirut, a security source and a witness said. At least one of the blasts took place near a funeral organized by Iran-backed Hezbollah for those killed the previous day when thousands of pagers used by the group exploded across the country.

At least three people were killed in the Bekaa region in the east of the country in the latest device blasts, the state news agency reported on Wednesday.

The group said on Wednesday it had attacked Israeli artillery positions with rockets in the first strike at its arch-foe since pager blasts wounded thousands of its members in Lebanon and raised the prospect of a wider Middle East war.

Israel's spy agency Mossad, which has a long history of sophisticated operations on foreign soil, planted explosives inside pagers imported by Hezbollah months before Tuesday's detonations, a senior Lebanese security source and another source told Reuters.

The death toll rose to 12, including two children, Lebanese Health Minister Firass Abiad said on Wednesday. Tuesday's attack wounded nearly 3,000 people, including many of the militant group's fighters and Iran's envoy to Beirut.