A suspected suicide bomber has rammed the gates of the Chinese embassy in the Kyrgyz capital Bishek, killing himself and wounding three others, officials say.
An Interior Ministry spokesman said the car exploded inside the compound and quoted Deputy Prime Minister Janysh Razakov as describing the blast as "a terrorist act".
Police, who cordoned off the building and the adjacent area, and the GKNB state security service said they were investigating the incident.
Authorities in Kyrgyzstan, a mostly Muslim former Soviet republic of six million people, routinely detain suspected Islamist militants accused of being linked to the Islamic State, which actively recruits from Central Asia.
An anti-Chinese militant group made up of ethnic Uighurs is also active in the region. In 2014, Kyrgyz border guards killed 11 people believed to be members of that group who had illegally crossed the Chinese-Kyrgyz border.
China condemned the assault and urged the Kyrgyz authorities to "quickly investigate and determine the real situation behind the incident.
"China is deeply shocked by this and strongly condemns this violent and extreme act," foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying told a regular news briefing in Beijing.
Three embassy staff suffered minor injuries and had been taken to hospital, but no organisation had yet claimed responsibility, Hua said.
China's state news agency Xinhua said five people were wounded: two security guards and three Kyrgyz nationals working at the embassy.
