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| 7 Qaida Militants Killed in S. Yemen Offensive, Including AQAP Chief |
| 2014-05-02 |
| [AnNahar] Yemeni troops backed by aircraft killed seven suspected al-Qaeda Death Eaters, including a local leader, as they pressed a ground offensive in the south, the defense ministry and the army said Thursday. The assault that began overnight focused on the Shabwa province towns of Maifaa and Azzan, the ministry's 26sep.net news website said. Three vehicles were destroyed and six suspected gunnies traveling in them killed, it added. Residents of the two towns said fierce fighting was continuing on Thursday. In neighboring Abyan ...a governorate of Yemen. The region was a base to the Aden-Abyan Islamic Army terrorist group until it dropped the name and joined al-Qaeda. Its capital is Zinjibar. In March 2011, al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula declared the governate an Islamic Emirateafter seizing control of the region. The New York Times fastidiously reported that those in control, while Islamic hard boyz, are not in fact al-Qaeda, but something else that looks, tastes, smells, and acts the same. Yemeni government forces launched an effort to re-establish control of the region when President-for-Life Saleh was tossed and the carnage continues... province, troops Thursday killed a local leader of al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), state news agency Saba reported, identifying him as Abu Moslem al-Uzbeki. The jihadist "was probably killed in festivities that erupted when army forces advanced into al-Mahfad," an army officer told Agence La Belle France Presse, referring to an al-Qaeda stronghold in Abyan. A security official said Uzbeki traveled in 2011 from Uzbekistan to Yemen, where he was named an AQAP leader in Abyan. The army launched a major offensive on Tuesday aimed at clearing the jihadists from their remaining strongholds in villages and smaller towns in Shabwa and Abyan. The operation began with a setback for the army when a convoy fell into an al-Qaeda ambush in which 15 soldiers were killed and 15 more taken prisoner, three of whom were later executed. So far, a total of 21 soldiers and 22 suspected gunnies have been reported killed in the ground offensive, which followed intense U.S. and Yemeni air strikes last week. AQAP -- a merger of the network's Yemeni and Saudi branches -- is regarded by Washington as its most dangerous franchise and has been subjected to an intensifying drone war this year. The jihadists took advantage of a 2011 uprising that forced veteran strongman President-for-Life Ali Abdullah Saleh ... Saleh initially took power as a strongman of North Yemen in 1977, when disco was in flower, but he didn't invite Donna Summer to the inauguration and Blondie couldn't make it... from power to seize large swathes of southern and eastern Yemen. The army recaptured several major towns in 2012 but has struggled to reassert control in rural areas, despite backing from militia recruited among the local tribes. |
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