One dead, 3 wounded in suicide blast at Chinese Embassy in Kyrgyzstan

An explosion at the Chinese embassy in Bishkek, Krrgyzstan. (Photo: Twitter)

"As a result of the explosion only the suicide bomber terrorist died. Security guards were injured," Kyrgyzstan's Deputy Prime Minister Jenish Razakov told journalists.

A source at the Bishkek police told AFP that the Mitsubishi Delica car smashed a gate on the embassy before blowing up in the centre of the compound close to the ambassador's residence.

Another source with the Central Asian nation's security service said that an "explosive device" had been placed inside the vehicle.

Local medics said the driver of the car was killed while two Kyrgyz embassy staff and a woman were lightly wounded in the blast.

Local residents told AFP that the blast had blown in their windows and caused their houses to shake.

Employees from the Chinese and nearby American embassy were evacuated, the Kyrgyz emergency service said.

Images circulating on social media show a plume of smoke rising in a part of Bishkek, the Kyrgyz capital and shattered pieces of concrete.

Impoverished majority Muslim Kyrgyzstan has a history of political instability and battling Islamist extremism.

The economically troubled ally of Russia has seen two governments overthrown and ethnic violence claim hundreds of lives since it gained independence in 1991.

The authorities regularly announce that they have foiled attacks planned by the Islamic State group in the country.

Security forces last year said they had engaged in several deadly shootouts with suspected "terrorists" in Bishkek.

Officials say that some 500 Kyrgyz are thought to have joined the ranks of Islamic State fighting in Syria and Iraq.

Chinese officials in the country have previously been targeted, with one shot dead in 2000 in an attack blamed on radicals from China's Uighur minority.

Kyrgyzstan and the other ex-Soviet Central Asian nations have come under fire for using a purported terror threat to silence criticism of their secular regimes.