BEIRUT -- An official at the Iranian embassy here denied reports that the man killed in a Saturday car bomb in this Lebanese capital worked for the embassy, IRNA reported.

The unnamed official said the victim, whose name has been given as Ali Saleh from Brital in the Lebanon's eastern Bekaa valley, had never worked for the embassy, neither did he have any connection with the diplomatic office.

News reports said that the blast in the southern suburbs of Beirut blew Saleh to pieces, as well as seriously injuring a passerby.

They said explosives hidden in the car's differential ripped it apart as its owner drove away from his residence.

Witnesses said the blast gouged a gaping hole in the ground, propelled the car about 10 meters (yards) and blew its driver to pieces.

The Lebanese resistance group Hizbullah announced the "martyrdom" of a member whom it identified as Ali Hussein Saleh, 42.

Saleh, the group said, was among those who joined Hizbullah shortly after its establishment and left behind an "eye-catching" record of activities in the group's resistance operations.

Hizbullah is widely popular among Lebanese for conducting a resistance campaign which helped drive Israeli forces from south Lebanon in 2000 after a 22-year occupation. Agence France Press quoted Hizbullah deputy, Mohammad Raad, as telling Christian radio station, the Voice of Lebanon, that he could "not exclude the Israeli secret services from being behind the attack."