Visiting U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Tuesday thanked Syria for its response to an attack on the U.S. Embassy in Damascus.

"We appreciate the response of the Syrian security forces to help secure our territory," Rice told reporters in Stellarton in Canada's eastern province of Nova Scotia.

She said it was too early to say who might have been behind the attack.

"It's too early to tell who might have been responsible for the attack ... We will have to do the forensics," Rice told a news conference in Stellarton after talks with Canadian Foreign Minister Peter MacKay.

Earlier on Tuesday, four men shouting Islamic slogans tried to blow up the U.S. Embassy in Damascus, but their car bomb failed to go off. Syrian security guards killed three of them in a shootout. A Syrian guard was also killed.

Rice said American nationals at the embassy were "safe and secure and accounted for and that's very good news" and expressed condolences over the death of a member of Syria's anti-terror squad.

"I do think that the Syrians reacted to this attack in a way that helped to secure our people and we very much appreciate that."

Rice arrived in eastern Canada to express thanks to the Canadians who took in thousands of stranded American air passengers after the 9/11 attacks five years ago.

She read a letter of thanks from U.S. President George W. Bush upon her arrival at Halifax's international airport.

More than 30,000 travelers on 247 U.S.-bound planes were diverted to Canada on Sept. 11, 2001. Most were stranded there for almost three days while U.S. airspace was closed for fear that more planes could be used in terror attacks. Eastern Canadian residents opened their homes, school gyms, stadiums and cafeterias to host the strangers.

Source: Xinhua