A car is ablaze following an explosion in Saudi city of Qatif. ? Al Arabiya

RIYADH: An explosion took place in a Saudi Arabian city of Qatif on Thursday and emergency vehicles converged on the scene, a witness told AFP.

It was the latest incident in the city, where Daesh militants have carried out deadly attacks in recent years.

"The explosion was very huge," the witness said, asking not to be identified.

Armoured and other police vehicles sealed off the area after the explosion, the witness said.

Saudi television channel Al-Arabiya reported a car bombing was the cause of the explosion.

Video and photographs posted on social media showed a vehicle engulfed in flames in the middle of a street, with dense black smoke rising around it.

Other images showed what appeared to be at least one charred body lying beside a vehicle, which looked like an SUV, after firefighters extinguished the blaze.

In 2014, Daesh began a campaign of bombings and shootings that has killed more than 40 people in Saudi Arabia´s Eastern Province, which includes Qatif.

In August, police said they shot dead a would-be suicide bomber targeting a mosque in Qatif.

Two months later, a gunman killed five people at a meeting hall in Saihat district of Qatif.

Last month, violence escalated around a redevelopment project in the old section of Awamiya, a Qatif-area town.

The interior ministry said criminals engaged in the drug and arms trade were involved in the unrest.

A police officer was killed by a rocket-propelled grenade, following the shooting deaths of an infant and a Pakistani man, in Awamiya.