Al Qaeda suspects ambushed and killed five men in eastern Yemen

By Nasser Arrabyee, 26/01/2011

Gunmen believed to be Al Qaeda operatives killed four soldiers and a post officer and plundered about 50,000US$ from their cars before they ran away in the eastern province of Hudhrmout, local sources said Wednesday.

The financial officer of the Hudhrmout post office, Omar Al Amudi, was killed and four other soldiers who were escorting him, the sources said.

Al Amudi was transferring more than 10 million Yemeni Rials (50,000US$) as salaries from Mukalla, the capital of the province, to Al Shehr district, when the gunmen ambushed him and his guards.

The gunmen plundered the money from car of the post office before they ran away from the scene in Al Hema area between Mukalla and Al Shehr. The gunmen were riding a four-wheel drive land cruiser car, sources said according to eyewitnesses.

Three other people were injured in the incident, two employees of the post office and one soldier, and the three of them were admitted to Al Shehr hospital, the sources said.

Six soldiers on board of a military vehicle were escorting the post office cashier Al Amudi, the sources said.

The incident might be the first after the American-Yemeni extremist cleric Anwar A Awlaki instructed Al Qaeda operatives to finance themselves from the money of the “enemies and Qafer”. The instructions came in an article published in the latest issue of Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) magazine , Inspire, earlier this month.