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A suicide bomber blew himself up at the convoy of high-ranking military officials, killing Maj. Gen. Salim Ali Qatan, commander of the southern military region, and injuring some of his bodyguards at Reemi neighborhood in Aden's Mansoura district, the local police officer said on condition of anonymity.
"An al-Qaida suicide attacker, detonated his explosives belt on Qatan's car as he was passing through a main street in Mansoura city," the police officer said.
"Body parts of a 25-year-old al-Qaida extremist were scattered everywhere after the incident," he added.
A local medic told Xinhua anonymously that "the military official died after he sustained critical injuries in different parts of his body."
Witnesses said that traffic police and criminal investigators arrived at the bombing scene and moved the body to a nearby hospital morgue.
The country's defense ministry confirmed the attack in a text message obtained by Xinhua, saying that "the suicide assailant who conducted Monday's operation was a Somali national." However, the ministry did not give any more details.
Several military officials have been assassinated in recent months, with government authorities blaming members of the Yemen- based al-Qaida branch.
The Yemeni government troops have waged an intensive military campaign last month, with the support of the United States and Yemen's oil-rich neighbor Saudi Arabia, to uproot the al-Qaida militants in the southern regions.
Last Tuesday, the Yemeni armed forces took control of Jaar and Zinjibar, two major al-Qaida strongholds in Abyan that had been under al-Qaida control for more than a year.
Yemen's al-Qaida wing, locally known as the Partisans of Sharia (Islamic Law), threatened to spread the fight and suicide attacks all over the country after it was routed from its main strongholds in Abyan.
from XINHUA
2012-06-18 15:11:28
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