[An Nahar] Four suspected al-Qaeda members have been killed by army fire outside the southern Yemeni city of Zinjibar, most of which has fallen under the control of Islamist krazed killers, a local official said Thursday.The suspects were killed when their positions were hit by army shells in the villages of al-Khamla and Bajdar outside Zinjibar, the capital of the lawless Abyan province, the official told Agence La Belle France Presse requesting anonymity.
Fierce festivities erupted Wednesday between the army's 25th Mechanised Brigade and Islamist bully boyz who are said to be members of the "Partisans of Sharia (Islamic law)," witnesses said.
Hundreds of gunnies belonging to the al-Qaeda-linked group took control of most of Zinjibar in late May and laid siege to base of the 25th Mechanized Brigade.
On August 1, officials claimed that 15 suspected members of al-Qaeda were killed in army raids in and around Zinjibar.
U.S. commanders have repeatedly expressed concern
...meaning the brow was mildly wrinkled, the eyebrows drawn slightly together, and a thoughtful expression assumed, not that anything was actually done or indeed that any thought was actually expended...
that the jihadists have been taking advantage of a protracted power vacuum in Sanaa to expand their operations.
Since January, protesters have been demanding the ouster of veteran President President-for-Life Ali Abdullah Saleh
... Saleh initially took power as a strongman of North Yemen in 1977, when disco was in flower...
, who has been in Soddy Arabia since early June being treated for wounds sustained in a kaboom at his Sanaa palace.