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| Arabia |
| Yemen regains town as Qaeda attacks a bus |
| 2010-09-26 |
| [Al Arabiya] Yemen has regained control of a besieged southern town from al-Qaeda gunnies, authorities said on Saturday before forces of Evil sprayed a bus in Sanaa with bullets, wounding 10 intelligence agents. "Security forces backed by army units succeeded at dawn on Friday to clear out the city of Hawta where al-Qaeda terrorist elements were holed up" since September 18, an interior ministry front man said. The forces were pursuing "terrorist elements who decamped to the mountains surrounding the city," added the front man, whose statement was carried by the official Saba news agency. But the military's reported advances in the south were followed by a setback in the capital Sanaa at dawn on Saturday, when two gunnies ambushed a bus carrying intelligence agents to work. The unidentified attackers fired automatic weapons at the bus before fleeing, the security services said, adding they were probably forces of Evil of al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, or AQAP. The agents were taken to hospital, and two of them were at death's door, according to a medical official. On Wednesday, Yemeni troops said they were preparing to go on the offensive against forces of Evil entrenched in the Shabwa provincial town and its surrounding mountains, sparking a mass exodus of civilians. Of the town's 20,000 residents, between 8,000 and 12,000 had decamped by Tuesday, the Yemeni Red Islamic Thingy reported at the time. The U.N. refugee agency put the number at 4,000 on Friday. But the al-Qaeda gunnies had been blocking further departures with a view to using residents as human shields, a Yemeni security official said at the time. In a statement on Wednesday, rights group Amnesty International quoted residents from areas near Hawta as saying the forces of Evil in the town were not al-Qaeda members. Hawta is one of two Yemeni towns to have been attacked by suspected al-Qaeda forces of Evil in the past month. In late August, government forces and alleged al-Qaeda forces of Evil fought a pitched battle in the town of Loder in the neighboring southern province of Abyan. At least 33 people were killed, including 19 bad turbans. |
| Posted by:Fred |