Yemeni army kills 35 fighters in the south

May 25, 2012

By Agencies

Yemeni forces have killed at least 35 al-Qaeda fighters in the southern part of the country, the defence ministry said.

The ministry said the Yemeni military took control of Wadi Banaa Arab, near the town of Jaar, after it launched a wide-scale on an al-Qaeda stronghold in the area.

Thursday's attack came after al-Qaeda claimed responsibility for a suicide bombing on Monday at a military parade rehearsal in the capital, Sana'a, and killed 100 Yemeni soldiers.

According to Yemeni state media, funerals were held on Thursday for 67 of the slain soldiers.

Militants affiliated with al-Qaeda have strengthened their foothold in Yemen, taking advantage of a year of political turmoil and a weak central government in the impoverished Arabian Peninsula country.

Yemeni troops are fighting opposition fighers in southern cities, as the government presses ahead with a US-backed offensive to help stabilise the impoverished Arab state.

Yemeni warplanes also launched strikes on Jaar, but no casualties have been reported, residents said.

Western and Gulf Arab countries have watched with mounting alarm as a political crisis in Yemen has given al-Qaeda the opportunity to develop a base from which to launch attacks around the world.

Fighters in the south exploited mass protests last year against former President Ali Abdullah Saleh to seize large swathes of territory.

In the strategically important city of Zinjibar, Islamist fighters on Thursday launched a counter-attack against government forces from the eastern parts of the city but were pushed back, a local army official said. One soldier was wounded in the fighting.

The Yemeni army recaptured parts of the southern city of Zinjibar on Wednesday.

The advance of troops into the centre and northern neighbourhoods of Zinjibar, the capital of Abyan province, represents a new front in the government's offensive to reclaim areas seized by insurgents in the south.

Washington has stepped up drone attacks in Yemen since President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi took office in February, and the Pentagon said it had recently resumed sending military trainers to the Arab state.

The United States and Saudi Arabia have come to regard Yemen-based al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, known as AQAP, as the network's most dangerous wing.

Early in May, Washington said Western and Arab intelligence agencies had foiled a plot to arm a suicide bomber with an improved version of an underwear bomb that failed to explode on a 2009 US-bound flight.

Four people wounded in Yemen's al-Baydha

By Fatik al-Rodaini

SANA'A, May 25, 2012- A senior official in Yemen's southern province of al-Baydha was seriously injured along with three others when an explosive device went off near his passing vehicle.

According to security sources, Abdullah Taleb, the head of General People's Congress Rada'a branch  was wounded on Friday when an explosive device went off on his way to his home.

No one claimed responsibility of the attacks.

Meanwhile, at least 12 people were killed on Friday and five others were wounded in two separate attacks in Saada and al-Jawf provinces.

Security sources said that a suicide bomber has plowed his vehicle into a crowd in east Yemen, killing 12 and wounding five.

According to the sources Friday blast killed supporters of Shiite rebels gathering near a school in al-Hazm, the capital of al-Jawf province. He said the attacker was suspected to belong to an al-Qaida-linked group, which views Shiites as renegade Muslims.

In another incident, a security official said an attacker wearing an explosives belt blew himself up near a protest in northern Saada province, killing only himself.

Houthis accused in a statement posted on the internet American Ambassador to Yemen of being behind the attacks.

Car bomb blast kills 12 in northern Yemen

A suicide bomber driving an explosive-laden car killed at least 12 people and injured many more

By Saeed Al Batati, Correspondent

May 25, 2012

Sana'a: A suicide bomber driving an explosive-laden car killed at least 12 people and injured many more on Friday in Shia-held province of Jawaf, northern Yemen, hours after another suicide bomber failed to reach a Shiite protest in the same province, ministry of defense said.

The news website of the ministry reported that a woman and child were among the dead as the suicide bomber targeted a rally of Shiite rebels in the province bomber.

Earlier on Friday, a man wearing IED belt killed himself after failing to detonate himself inside the same protest, Huthi a rebels who control many province in the north of the country said.

In statement, the rebels said that a brainwashed suicide bomber sent by the US and Israel blew himself up in protest in order to stop them protesting against the "policies of injustice and tyranny."

The rebels protests was part of nation-wide protests that forced the former Yemen president Ali Abdullah Saleh to leave office in November last year.

Yemen: 35 al-Qaida militants killed in clashes

May 24, 2012

SANAA— Yemen says its troops have killed 35 al-Qaida militants in an attack on a hideout in the country's south, part of a wider offensive.

The attack comes four days after al-Qaida claimed responsibility for a suicide bombing on a military parade rehearsal in the capital, Sanaa. The bombing killed 96 Yemeni soldiers. Funerals for 67 of the soldiers were held on Thursday.

The Defense Ministry said Thursday that in its attack, the Yemeni military took control of Wadi Banaa Arab, near the town of Jaar, another al-Qaida stronghold.

For several weeks, Yemen's military has been pushing an offensive against al-Qaida, aiming to uproot the militants from territory they overran during more than a year of internal political turmoil in Yemen. Casualties have been high on both sides.

Clinton: State department hacked al-Qaida sites in Yemen, part of covert war on terror

Clinton: State department hacked al-Qaida sites in Yemen, part of covert war on terror

May 24, 2012

TAMPA, Fla. (AP) ' Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton says U.S. cyber experts hacked al-Qaida propaganda online in Yemen, changing ads that bragged about killing Americans into ads that showed the death toll of al-Qaida attacks against Yemenis.

Clinton says the cyber attack was launched by State Department specialists who patrol the web and social media to counter al-Qaida's attempts to recruit new followers. It was a rare public admission of the ongoing covert cyber war against extremists.

Speaking in Tampa, Fla., alongside special operations chief Adm. Bill McRaven, Clinton said the effort is part of a multipronged attack on terrorism that goes beyond raids like the one that killed Osama bin Laden to include diplomats working alongside special operations forces to shore up local governments and economies and train local forces.