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US drone strike kills five al-Qaida members in Yemen

Xinhua, February 11, 2015 Adjust font size:

A U.S. drone strike bombed a gathering of al-Qaida gunmen in Yemen's southeastern province of Hadramout on Tuesday, leaving five terrorists killed, a military official told Xinhua.

"The U.S. drone fired three missiles on a gathering of al-Qaida operatives in the Sert Valley in Hadramout province, killing five commanders of the terrorist group," the local military official said on condition of anonymity.

A local tribal source told Xinhua by phone that "a number of al-Qaida members were killed and burned along with their cars during the bombing."

Yemen, an impoverished Arab country, has been gripped by one of the most active regional al-Qaida insurgencies in the Middle East.

AQAP, which emerged in January 2009 and also known locally as Ansar al-Sharia, had claimed responsibility for a number of attacks on some Western countries.

However, security situation worsened after Yemen's president and prime minister submitted resignations last month which created power vacuum that could benefit the AQAP in the country's southern regions.

Last month, Washington said it would not suspended anti-terror operations against the al-Qaida activities in Yemen following Yemen's Shiite Houthi group took over the country's capital Sanaa. Endit