Sana’a: Seven Al Qaida militants were killed on Friday night when a suspected US drone hit an area overrun by the militants in Yemen's southern province of Shabwa, a local journalist told Gulf News.
Ibrahim Mohammad Al Banna, an Egyptian, the son of Anwar Al Awlaqi and his cousin were among the top Al Qaida leaders who were killed in the airstrike, two weeks after a similar attack killed Anwar Al Awlaqi, top wanted Al Qaida member in Yemen.
Al Banna is the media chief of Al Qaida’s offshoot in Yemen. "The drone hit the militants when they were parking near a checkpoint controlled by Ansar Al Sharia in Azzan district. The huge explosion left a big hole in the area," the journalist said.
According to the journalist, who preferred to remain anonymous, Al Qaida militants in Yemen seized control of Azzan in May.
"The bodies of Al Awlaqi’s relative were taken to his hometown in Al Said district in Shabwa,” he added. In retaliation for the killing of their colleagues, three hours after the attack, Al Qaida blew up a gas pipeline miles away.
The pipeline supplies gas from the gas-rich province of Mareb to the export port in Balhaf, Shabwa. Yemen’s Ministry of Defence confirmed the attack on the militants, but said it was carried out by the government and not the US.
"As part of the continuous Yemeni effort in tackling terrorists, security forces managed to carry out on Friday night a successful operation that killed Ibrahim Mohammad Al Banna, an Egyptian, and other terrorists in Azzan,” a security source said.
The ministry identified Al Banna as the Al Qaida media chief and the most dangerous figure who is wanted internationally. Al Banna is responsible for attacks against national and foreign interests in the country and has planned many terrorist attacks inside and outside of Yemen, according to the ministry.
Despite recent efforts to hit Al Qaida, the Yemeni army has been unable to thoroughly stamp out Al Qaida in the restive southern province of Abyan.
Yemen’s vice president Abd Rabu Mansour Hadi has recently said that the army killed 700 militants since the beginning of the operation in May.
The Al Qaida offshoot in Yemen has exploited months of unrest in the country and taken control of two main cities in Abyan and one in the neighboring Shabwa.
In Mukalla, southern Yemen, Mubarak Al Nahdi, an intelligence security official was killed on Saturday when unknown masked men opened fire on him while leaving his office. The assailants used a motorcycle in the attack, a tactic that has been widely used by Al Qaida operatives when they target security officials.
