MOSCOW — A suicide bomber blew himself up inside the Chinese Embassy’s compound in Bishkek, the capital of Kyrgyzstan, on Tuesday morning, wounding three Kyrgyz staff members, according to local officials.

The attacker rammed the gates of the embassy with a Mitsubishi Delica that exploded about 160 feet into the compound. The driver died on the scene.

“This was a suicide bomber, three people got injured, they were hospitalized,” Zhenish Razakov, the country’s deputy prime minister, told journalists in a video that was released by a local news website.</s>A suspected suicide bomber crashed a car through the entrance of the Chinese Embassy in the Kyrgyzstan capital of Bishkek, detonating a bomb that killed the attacker and wounded three embassy employees.

China denounced the attack and appealed to Kyrgyz authorities to identify and harshly punish anyone involved. No group claimed responsibility.

The Central Asian nation’s interior ministry said the person who drove the vehicle through the gate died when the bomb detonated. The three people injured are Kyrgyz nationals: two 17-year-old embassy gardeners and an unidentified woman. Almaz Kubatbekov, chief physician at the Bishkek National Trauma and Orthopedics Institute, said the three victims suffered concussions and multiple bruises.

Photos from the scene showed the inner courtyard of the embassy compound littered with debris. Windows of one building were smashed and the plastered walls pockmarked with shrapnel.

The embassy in Bishkek’s southern suburbs neighbours the US embassy.

Kyrgyzstan’s interior ministry described it as a terrorist attack. Deputy Prime Minister Zhenish Razakov told the Interfax news agency it was a suicide bombing.

The country, a landlocked former Soviet republic that borders China, has a predominantly Muslim population that is considered moderate in outlook.

A Kyrgyz news website, Kloop.kg, quoted Razakov as saying that he would lead a meeting on tightening security ahead of Kyrgyz Independence Day today and a summit of former Soviet nations in mid-September. In Beijing, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying described the three victims’ injuries as minor but called for a stern security response.

“China is appalled and strongly condemns the violent act,” Hua told reporters at a daily briefing.

She said China’s foreign ministry has “demanded that Kyrgyz authorities take all necessary measures to ensure the safety of Chinese institutions and personnel in Kyrgyzstan, launch a thorough investigation to find out the truth of the incident and harshly punish the perpetrators.”

Kyrgyz authorities offered no guidance on the attacker or a possible motive.

The Chinese regularly have blamed separatists and religious extremists for attacks in China’s northwest region of Xinjiang, which borders Kyrgyzstan. Al-Qaida and the Islamic State group also have threatened to attack Chinese targets in retaliation for alleged repression of Chinese Muslims, particularly those from the Turkic-speaking Uighur majority native to Xinjiang.

Officials say that some 500 Kyrgyz nationals are believed to have joined so-called Islamic State in Syria and Iraq.

One of the three men who carried out an attack on Istanbul’s Ataturk airport in June was said to be from Kyrgyzstan. The suicide gun and bomb attack, which Turkey blamed on IS jihadists, left 44 people dead and 240 injured.

Chinese have been targeted in Kyrgyzstan in the past, including in 2000 when one official was shot dead in an attack blamed on Uighurs.

Kyrgyz border guards killed 11 people believed to be members of a Uighur anti-Chinese militant group after they were said to have illegally crossed the border in 2014.

In its travel advice to Kyrgyzstan, the UK government warns of an underlying threat from terrorism.

The radical pan-Islamic group, Hizb ut-Tahrir, is said to have a presence in the country. It was banned in 2006 amid accusations of links to the Taliban and al-Qaeda.</s>A car on Tuesday exploded after ramming a gate at the Chinese embassy in the capital of ex-Soviet Kyrgyzstan, police said.

Local medics said the driver of the car was killed while two Kyrgyz embassy staff and a woman were lightly wounded in the blast.</s>An explosion at the Chinese embassy in Kyrgyzstan has killed at least one person and wounded several others.

Kyrgyzstan’s deputy prime minister said a suicide bomber rammed his car into the gate of the embassy compound in the capital Bishkek, detonating a bomb and injuring three embassy employees.

Zhenish Razakov said the bomber had died and three embassy employees, all Kyrgyz nationals, were injured, Russia’s Interfax news agency reported.

The GKNB state security service said it was investigating the blast but provided no other details.

Kyrgyz news website 24.kg reported that the car appeared to have rammed the embassy’s gate before exploding.

Chinese state news agency Xinhua, citing a Kyrgyz security official, said it was a “suicide car bombing attack”.

This is a developing story, please check back for updates.</s>One dead, three wounded in blast at Chinese embassy in Kyrgyzstan

BISHKEK, Aug 30 (Reuters) - A car exploded near the Chinese embassy in Kyrgyzstan on Tuesday, killing its driver and wounding three people, the healthcare ministry said.

The GKNB state security service said it was investigating the blast but provided no other details.

The interior ministry could not be reached for comment. Kyrgyz news website 24.kg reported that the car appeared to have rammed the embassy's gate before exploding. (Reporting by Olga Dzyubenko; Writing by Olzhas Auyezov; Editing by Robert Birsel)</s>A car exploded near the Chinese embassy in Kyrgyzstan on Tuesday, killing its driver and wounding three people, the healthcare ministry said.

The GKNB state security service said it was investigating the blast but provided no other details.

The interior ministry could not be reached for comment. Kyrgyz news website 24.kg reported that the car appeared to have rammed the embassy’s gate before exploding.</s>Kyrgyzstan’s deputy prime minister says a suicide bomber has rammed his car into the gate of the Chinese embassy compound in the capital Bishkek, detonating a bomb and injuring three embassy employees.

 Russian news agencies on Tuesday quoted the Central Asian country’s health minister saying one person died and two more were injured in the blast.

 The Interfax news agency quoted deputy prime minister Zhenish Razakov as saying that the suicide bomber had rammed into the gate of the embassy, detonating the bomb. Razakov said the bomber died and three embassy employees, all Kyrgyz nations, were injured.</s>A suspected suicide bomber on Tuesday crashed a car through the entrance of the Chinese Embassy in the Kyrgyzstan capital of Bishkek, detonating a bomb that killed the attacker and wounded three embassy employees.

Nobody has yet claimed responsibility for the attack, although both Al Qaeda and ISIS have threatened attacks against China over Beijing's treatment of the country's Muslim minority.

Two of the injured are 17-year-old Kyrgyz gardeners working in the Embassy and an unidentified woman.

Almaz Kubatbekov, chief physician at the Bishkek National Trauma and Orthopedics Institute, said the three victims suffered concussions and multiple bruises.

Photos from the scene showed the inner courtyard of the embassy compound littered with debris. Windows of one building were smashed and the plastered walls pockmarked with shrapnel.

The embassy in Bishkek's southern suburbs neighbours the U.S. embassy.

Kyrgyzstan's interior ministry described it as a terrorist attack. Deputy Prime Minister Zhenish Razakov told the Interfax news agency it was a suicide bombing.

Kyrgyzstan, a landlocked former Soviet republic that borders China, has a predominantly Muslim population that is considered moderate in outlook.

A Kyrgyz news website, Kloop.kg, quoted Razakov as saying that he would lead a meeting Tuesday on tightening security ahead of Kyrgyz Independence Day on Wednesday and a summit of former Soviet nations in mid-September.

In Beijing, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying described the three victims' injuries as minor but called for a stern security response.

'China is appalled and strongly condemns the violent act,' Hua told reporters at a daily briefing.

She said China's foreign ministry has 'demanded that Kyrgyz authorities take all necessary measures to ensure the safety of Chinese institutions and personnel in Kyrgyzstan, launch a thorough investigation to find out the truth of the incident and harshly punish the perpetrators.'

Kyrgyz authorities offered no guidance on the attacker or a possible motive.

The Chinese regularly have blamed separatists and religious extremists for attacks in China's northwest region of Xinjiang, which borders Kyrgyzstan. Al-Qaida and ISIS also have threatened to attack Chinese targets in retaliation for alleged repression of Chinese Muslims, particularly those from the Turkic-speaking Uighur majority native to Xinjiang.</s>BISHKEK (TCA) — An unidentified suicide car bomber attacked the Chinese Embassy in Kyrgyzstan’s capital Bishkek in the morning of August 30, killing himself and wounding three embassy employees.

Kyrgyzstan's Deputy Prime Minister Jenish Razakov said the driver rammed through a gate to get inside the Chinese Embassy compound and detonated an explosive device that was inside the car, RFE/RL reported.



Kyrgyzstan's Health Ministry said the three people wounded by the blast were Kyrgyz nationals and had been hospitalized with shrapnel-like injuries — suggesting the explosive device may have been prepared as a fragmentation bomb.



Kyrgyzstan's security service sources said several hours after the attack that investigators were still working to identify the man found inside the car after the explosion. They said the investigators also were trying to establish the identity of the car's owner.



China is shocked and strongly condemns the car bombing near the Chinese Embassy in Kyrgyzstan, a China Foreign Ministry spokesperson said on August 30, Xinhua reports. 



The Chinese embassy in Bishkek was attacked by a car bomb Tuesday morning, causing injuries to three people of the embassy, spokesperson Hua Chunying told a press conference in Beijing.



The Foreign Ministry has launched emergency procedures, and China requires Kyrgyzstan to take immediate and necessary measures to ensure the safety of Chinese people and institutions, Hua said.



She also urged the Kyrgyz side to investigate the bombing and bring the perpetrators to justice.</s>An explosion near China’s embassy in Kyrgyzstan on Tuesday was a “suicide car bombing attack”, state news agency Xinhua said, citing a Kyrgyz security official.

The driver of the vehicle tried to ram the embassy’s gate, the official was reported as saying.

The healthcare ministry earlier said the driver of the vehicle was killed and three people were injured.
A car bomb explodes near the Chinese embassy in Kyrgyzstan, killing the perpetrator and injuring three.