Gunmen shoot dead police chief in southeastern Yemen

Unknown gunmen assassinated a police chief in Yemen's southeastern province of Hadramout Tuesday afternoon, a security source told Xinhua.

Colonel Murad al-Amoody, head of the Criminal Police Investigations and the Security Directorate of the Muklla city, Hadramout's provincial capital, was shot dead inside his car by unknown gunmen, the local security source said on condition of anonymity.

"They were masked and shot the colonel several times on his own car on the street and then fled the scene," the security source said.

Yemeni military officials have blamed gunmen of the al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) for a series of assassinations and armed attacks, mostly in the country's southern regions.

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 Yemen's army and government institutions, as well as some Western interests. Endit