A suicide car bomber targeted a US consulate vehicle in Pakistan Monday, in an attack officials said killed four.

A suicide car bomber targeted a US consulate vehicle in Pakistan Monday, in an attack officials said killed four.

The bomber struck during the morning rush hour, close to residential quarters used by the US consulate in the northwestern city of Peshawar and near the office of the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR).

Mian Iftikhar Hussein, information minister for Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, said four people were killed in the suicide attack, two of them Americans.

The US State Department confirmed that a consulate vehicle was hit in an apparent terrorist strike and said that four people were injured, but that no US consulate staff were killed.

Spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said two Americans and two Pakistanis working for the consulate were receiving medical treatment for their wounds, and that the US was "seeking further information about other victims".

When told that the United States denied US consulate personnel were killed, Hussein said: "What can I do if they are denying? Police confirmed to me that two of the dead were American diplomats."

Peshawar police chief Imtiaz Altaf said the vehicle of the suicide bomber was carrying up to 110 kilos of explosives, including more than 10 mortar shells. Altaf said up to 19 people were wounded.

It was not immediately clear who was responsible for the attack.

Although Islamabad is an ally of Washington, relations dramatically worsened after a CIA contractor killed two Pakistanis in the eastern city of Lahore.