American shot dead and another wounded, in attack at petrol station in Saudi Arabia

Police have said the incident happened in the eastern district of Riyadh, the capital of Saudi Arabia

An American has been shot dead and another wounded in Riyadh, the capital of Saudi Arabia, police have said (SAUL LOEB/AFP/Getty Images)

An American employee of a US defence contractor has been shot dead and another wounded in an attack in Saudi Arabia, security officials have said.

The attack happened when the two US nationals stopped at a petrol station in an eastern district of the kingdon's capital Riyadh, police said.

Saudi security forces later shot and wounded an alleged assailant before arresting him, the official Saudi Press Agency quoted a Riyadh police spokesman as saying

A brief statement, carried by state media, said: "The attack resulted in the killing of one person and wounding another and it turned out they were of American citizenship."

The SPA reported that the American wounded in the attack was left with "moderate" injuries.

Interior Ministry spokesman Major General Mansour Turki told Reuters the motive behind the attack was not yet known.

He said the alleged assailant was a Saudi national who was born in the US. A third US national in a separate vehicle witnessed the attack, he added.

The two Americans were employees of Vinnell Arabia, a US defense contractor supporting Saudi National Guard military programmes in Riyadh.

They were shot about roughly half-a-mile from its facility in the city, a State Department official said.

The site is also near the Saudi National Guard headquarters.

US officials have been in close contact with the Saudi government as they gathered details about the shooting and a possible motive, the official told the Associated Press.

US authorities were also evaluating security and will take steps to ensure the safety of all US Mission personnel, the official said.

The last reported killings of Westerners by armed assailants in Saudi Arabia occurred in 2007 when three French nationals were shot dead while camping in the northwest of the country.

Additional reporting by Reuters and Associated Press