A suspected Al-Qaeda suicide bomber blew himself up early Sunday in southern Yemen killing the commander of a local pro-army militia and wounding six people, Agence France Presse quoted a government official as saying.

Al-Manar TV reported that three Yemenis were killed due to the Sunday attack.

Two children were among the wounded in the town of Mudiya in the restive southern province of Abyan, the official said.

"An Al-Qaeda suicide bomber managed to enter a home used as a base by the Popular Resistance Committees and activated an explosives belt killing the local commander Nasser Ali Mansur and wounding six," he said.

The committees have recently become a target for Al-Qaeda militants who were forced to flee Abyan in June following battles led by the army, with the local militiamen backing them up.

A doctor in Aden told AFP he had helped evacuate three of the wounded from a hospital in the Abyan city of Loden to a bigger facility in Aden "because they are in critical condition."

The attack came hours after suspected Al-Qaeda militants killed 19 soldiers in a rocket attack and suicide bombing on Saturday that targeted intelligence headquarters in Aden, the main southern city in Yemen.

Al-Qaeda militants remain active in southern Yemen, where separatist militants also attack security forces, pressing their demands for renewed independence for the south.

South Yemen was a separate state before unification with the north in 1990.