At least 10 people have been killed in a suicide bomb attack on a Shia mosque in the Kuwaiti capital.
Dozens of people were injured, with images circulating online of bloodied bodies on the mosque floor amid debris. The blast hit during Friday prayers at the Imam Sadiq Mosque in al-Sawaber, a busy area to the east of Kuwait City.
An Islamic State- (IS) affiliated group said it was behind the attack. IS has carried out similar recent attacks in neighbouring Saudi Arabia and Yemen.
An Islamic State-affiliated group said it was behind the bombing
The governor of Kuwait City, Thabet al-Muhanna, told Reuters 10 people had died in the suicide attack. However, the AFP news agency said at least 13 people were killed, with at least 25 people taken to hospital with injuries.
A Kuwaiti MP, who saw the attacker, said the mosque was packed with some 2,000 people when there was a loud explosion, Reuters reported.
It was the first suicide blast to take place on a Shia mosque in Kuwait
"It was obvious from the suicide bomber's body that he was young. He walked into the prayer hall during sujood [kneeling in prayer], he looked... in his 20s, I saw him with my own eyes," Khalil al-Salih told the news agency.
Kuwaiti Prime Minister Sheikh Jaber al-Mubarak al-Sabah said the attack was an attempt to threaten national unity. "But this is too difficult for them and we are much stronger than that," he added.
State TV showed the Kuwaiti Emir, Sheikh Sabah al-Ahmad al-Sabah, visiting the damaged mosque.
An IS affiliate calling itself the Najd Province - the same group that claimed a pair of bombing attacks on Shia mosques in Saudi Arabia in recent weeks - said it was behind the attack.
Sunni-ruled Kuwait has a large Shia minority, which IS considers to be heretics.
