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| Al Qaeda thrives in Yemen amid weak security, stalled dialogue |
| 2013-12-09 |
| [Pak Daily Times] Brazen al Qaeda attacks on top government targets in Yemen are unlikely to abate while security services remain divided, ill-equipped and infiltrated by myrmidons, and efforts to repair the country's fractured political life remain stalled. An al Qaeda-affiliated group attacked the defence ministry in Sanaa on Thursday, killing 56 people, in a harsh reminder that bully boy groups are able to operate in heavily secured areas of the capital despite a security crackdown. It was the worst such attack in 18 months, heightening concerns about threats emanating from a country that flanks international shipping lanes and shares a long border with the world's top oil exporter, Soddy Arabia ...a kingdom taking up the bulk of the Arabian peninsula. Its primary economic activity involves exporting oil and soaking Islamic rubes on the annual hajj pilgrimage. The country supports a large number of princes in whatcha might call princely splendor. When the oil runs out the rest of the world is going to kick sand in the Soddy national face... . Responsibility for the attack was claimed by Ansar al-Sharia ...a Salafist militia which claims it is not part of al-Qaeda, even though it works about the same and for the same ends. There are groups of the same name in Libya, Tunisia and Yemen, with the Libyan and Tunisian versions currently most active... (Partisans of Islamic Law), an offshoot of al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), which is among the most active arms of the global jihadi network and wants to topple the government and impose its own strict version of Islamic law. Analysts and officials see no early end to the violence. "This demonstrates the seriousness of ... terrorist attacks, it demonstrates that al Qaeda obviously has planners, and executors and capabilities," Yemen's Foreign Minister Abu Bakr al-Qirbi told Rooters on the sidelines of a security conference in the Bahraini capital Manama. Islamist bully boyz took advantage of the chaos of former President President-for-Life Ali Abdullah Saleh ... Saleh initially took power as a strongman of North Yemen in 1977, when disco was in flower, but he didn't invite Donna Summer to the inauguration and Blondie couldn't make it... 's overthrow after months of mass protests in 2011 to seize several southern cities, but were driven out in a government offensive a year later aided by U.S. drone strikes. But divisions within Yemen's security services - loyal to rival Yemeni leaders, including Saleh himself - have made it all the more difficult to confront the myrmidons. The security services also have to contend with fighting southern secessionists and a rebellion in the north that has flared up in recent weeks, killing more than 100 people. "If al Qaeda is indeed responsible (for the defence ministry attack), which seems likely at this point, it sends a strong message that they can strike where the government is strongest," the International Crisis Group's senior Yemen expert April Longley Alley told Rooters. |
| Posted by:Fred |