MOSCOW: Four people were killed and several wounded last night when a terrorist bomb exploded in Grozny, the war-shattered capital of breakaway Chechnya.

The blast damaged a car carrying Chechnya's deputy prosecutor-general, Magomed Magomadov, who was unhurt. He is heading an investigation into the abduction of Russian envoy Valentin Vlasov, the highest-profile captive to fall into kidnappers' hands when he was seized at gunpoint from his car on May 1.

Magomed Koriyev, first deputy director of the Chechen security service, said the target was Magomadov, and the security service had already identified suspects.

The bomb was buried in the road leading to the prosecutor-general's office. The four people killed were all travelling in a car.