One dead, three injured in shooting outside Australia nightclub

Sydney: A drive-by shooting outside a nightclub in the Australian city of Melbourne inflicted "horrific injuries" that killed a security guard and wounded three men, police said on Sunday, but there was no suggestion yet that the attack was terror-related.

Australia has some of the world's toughest gun control laws, adopted after its worst mass murder, when a gunman killed 35 people at Port Arthur in the island state of Tasmania in 1996.

Sunday's shooting took place around 3.20 a.m. in the lively entertainment district of Melbourne's southeastern suburb of Prahran, police said.

Three security guards and a man queuing to enter were taken to hospital with gunshot injuries, police said in a televised news conference in Melbourne.

"It would appear that shots have been discharged from a car in this area into a crowd standing outside the nightclub," homicide inspector Andrew Stamper said.

The victims suffered "horrific injuries" from a weapon fired in close proximity, he added.