Al-Qaida claims responsibility for killing U.S. intelligence officer in Yemen's Aden

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ADEN, Yemen, March 2 (Xinhua) -- The Yemen-based al-Qaida wing said Friday that it had killed a U.S. intelligence officer in the southern port city of Aden.

"Our brave fighters opened fire at a team of U.S. intelligence officers in the southern city of Aden on Thursday, killing a CIA officer," the al-Qaida said in a text message received by Xinhua.

"We killed the officer after we monitored him and made sure that he was cooperating with the Sanaa government in the war against terrorism," the message said.

The group did not gave more details about the attack or elaborate how it conducted the operation against the U.S. team.

A close source to the al-Qaida militants told to Xinhua that " we saw a team of U.S. senior officers patrolling in the al-Mulla district in downtown Aden in a small military car."

"The officers' car came under attacks, which also injured a number of them," the source said.

On Thursday, a Yemeni security official told Xinhua that a brigade of Yemen's special forces were dispatched from Sanaa to Aden for an anti-terror training course conducted by a U.S. security team.

He said on condition of anonymity that the Yemeni special forces were preparing to engage next month in battles against al- Qaida militants in the neighboring restive province of Abyan.

The Yemeni government has given the militants ultimatum to quit captured cites in Abyan.

Taking advantage of one-year anti-government protests, the resurgent al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), known locally as Ansar al-Sharia (Partisans of Islamic Law), has taken control of several cities across the restive southern provinces.

The Yemeni government forces have been battling the AQAP militants in the south, leaving hundreds of people killed and thousands displaced.

The AQAP, entrenching itself mainly in Yemen's southern provinces of Abyan and Shabwa, is on the terrorist list of the United States.

Newly-elected President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi vowed to strengthen security and intelligence cooperation with the United States in combating the AQAP that threatened the daily oil shipping routes in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden.

Posted in: Abyan, ADEN, Al-Qaeda, Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, al-Qaida, AQAP, United States, Yemen