US citizens told to leave Yemen
7 Aug 2013 11:27 PM GMT
United States on Tuesday ordered Americans to leave Yemen ‘immediately’ amid a worldwide alert linked to electronic intercepts from al-Qaida leader Ayman al-Zawahiri. The alert, in which the State Department said it had ordered all non-essential staff out of Yemen, came hours after a drone strike killed four al-Qaida militants there and two days after the closure of some two dozen embassies in the Middle East and Africa.
Britain also said on Tuesday it had withdrawn all staff from its embassy in Yemen, after US ordered its citizens to leave the country following a worldwide terror alert. ‘Due to increased security concerns, all staff in our Yemen embassy have been temporarily withdrawn, and the embassy will remain closed until staff are able to return,’ a statement from the Foreign Office said.
Intercepts between Zawahiri and Nasser al-Wuhayshi, the leader of al-Qaida’s Yemen affiliate, sparked the closure of the US missions overseas and an earlier worldwide travel alert, US media reported.
The New York Times said late Monday that the electronic communications last week revealed that Zawahiri had ordered al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula to carry out an attack as early as this past Sunday. CNN meanwhile reported that Zawahiri told Wuhayshi to ‘do something,’ causing officials in both Washington and Yemen to fear an attack was imminent. As a result, roughly two dozen US diplomatic posts were shuttered across the Middle East Sunday, and the State Department said 19 would remain shut through Saturday.
Al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) is seen as the terror network’s most capable franchise following the decimation of its core leadership in Afghanistan and Pakistan in recent years.
The Yemen-based group has attempted a number of attacks on US soil, including a bid to bring down a passenger plane in 2009 by a man wearing explosives in his underwear and a failed plot to send bombs concealed in printers.
US in turn has launched scores of drone strikes in Yemen, where the militant group thrives in vast, lawless areas largely outside the government’s control. A drone strike in Yemen early Tuesday struck a vehicle, killing four suspected al-Qaida militants ‘in a ball of fire,’ a tribal source told AFP.
One of the four was on a list released by Yemeni authorities of 25 Al-Qaeda operatives suspected of plotting attacks to coincide with the end of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan later this week, according to the source. It was not immediately clear if the State Department alert was related to the drone strike. US officials, who rarely acknowledge the covert drone program, could not be reached for comment.
Several US allies, including Britain, France, Germany and Norway, have also announced closures of some of their missions in the region. The US closure list includes 15 embassies or consulates that were shut on Sunday, the fifteenth anniversary of al-Qaida’s attacks on US embassies in East Africa, as well as four additional posts.
Britain also said on Tuesday it had withdrawn all staff from its embassy in Yemen, after US ordered its citizens to leave the country following a worldwide terror alert. ‘Due to increased security concerns, all staff in our Yemen embassy have been temporarily withdrawn, and the embassy will remain closed until staff are able to return,’ a statement from the Foreign Office said.
Intercepts between Zawahiri and Nasser al-Wuhayshi, the leader of al-Qaida’s Yemen affiliate, sparked the closure of the US missions overseas and an earlier worldwide travel alert, US media reported.
The New York Times said late Monday that the electronic communications last week revealed that Zawahiri had ordered al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula to carry out an attack as early as this past Sunday. CNN meanwhile reported that Zawahiri told Wuhayshi to ‘do something,’ causing officials in both Washington and Yemen to fear an attack was imminent. As a result, roughly two dozen US diplomatic posts were shuttered across the Middle East Sunday, and the State Department said 19 would remain shut through Saturday.
Al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) is seen as the terror network’s most capable franchise following the decimation of its core leadership in Afghanistan and Pakistan in recent years.
The Yemen-based group has attempted a number of attacks on US soil, including a bid to bring down a passenger plane in 2009 by a man wearing explosives in his underwear and a failed plot to send bombs concealed in printers.
US in turn has launched scores of drone strikes in Yemen, where the militant group thrives in vast, lawless areas largely outside the government’s control. A drone strike in Yemen early Tuesday struck a vehicle, killing four suspected al-Qaida militants ‘in a ball of fire,’ a tribal source told AFP.
One of the four was on a list released by Yemeni authorities of 25 Al-Qaeda operatives suspected of plotting attacks to coincide with the end of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan later this week, according to the source. It was not immediately clear if the State Department alert was related to the drone strike. US officials, who rarely acknowledge the covert drone program, could not be reached for comment.
Several US allies, including Britain, France, Germany and Norway, have also announced closures of some of their missions in the region. The US closure list includes 15 embassies or consulates that were shut on Sunday, the fifteenth anniversary of al-Qaida’s attacks on US embassies in East Africa, as well as four additional posts.
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