SANAA, 9 August 2007 — Yemeni security forces carried out a sting raid operation yesterday and killed four militants including a senior Al-Qaeda operative accused of plotting last month’s car bomb attack that killed eight Spanish tourists and two Yemenis.
Security officials told Arab News that Qassim Yahya Al-Raimi, 28, one of Al-Qaeda’s leaders in the country and his comrade Ali bin Ali Douha and two unidentified suspects were killed in the area of Raghwan near the provincial city of Marib in northcentral Yemen.
Al-Raimi was among 23 Al-Qaeda operatives who escaped from a heavy-security intelligence prison in Sanaa in Feruary 2006.
He and Douha are believed to be among 10 Al-Qaeda fugitives suspected of having links to the July 2 suicide car bombing attack on a convoy of Spanish tourists near an archaeological site in Marib.
Yemeni government officials blamed the attack on the Al-Qaeda terrorist network, and identified the suicide attacker as Abdu Muhammad Rahiqa, 21.
Identities of the two other slain suspects could not be verified immediately, because there bodies were severely disfigured, the officials said.
Military helicopters took part in the operation that began with the tracking of two cars carrying the suspects about 15 km from the regional capital of Marib, some 190 kilometers northeast of Sanaa, the sources said. Two anti-terrorism personnel were injured in the fighting with the suspects, they added.
The killings came two days after the US Embassy in Sanaa urged American citizens living in Yemen to take extra security measures due to an “evolving terrorist threat against Western interests in Yemen.” “We are now experiencing terrorist actions previously unseen in Yemen,” the embassy said in a warden message posted on its website. Last week, Yemeni authorities identified the bomber and nine other members of the Al-Qaeda cell blamed for the Marib car bomb attack.
