'CIA missile' kills Yemen al-Qaida suspects

Six al-Qaida suspects, including Osama bin Laden’s top lieutenant in Yemen, were killed when US forces carried out their first overt strike on the terror group in the Middle East by firing a Hellfire missile on the suspects’ car.

A US official in Washington confirmed that US forces carried out the strike, believed to have been conducted by a CIA aircraft, possibly a missile-carrying Predator drone, in north-west Yemen.

Yemeni officials would not provide a formal explanation for the explosion, but tribesmen interviewed in the al-Qaida stronghold said they saw a Yemeni military helicopter hovering overhead shortly before the explosion.

The Yemeni news agency said “initial information” indicated that the dead included Qaed Salim Sinan al-Harethi, who US counter-intelligence officials believe was al-Qaida’s top operative in Yemen.

A tribesman said he saw al-Harethi’s dismembered body in the car.

“I know him like I know myself,” the tribesman said. ”That was him.”

Roadblocks were set up in the area, about 100 miles east of the capital, San’a, last night, and jets could be heard flying overhead. The type and nationality of the jets could not be determined.

Al-Harethi was a major target of American anti-terrorism efforts. He was an associate of bin Laden since the early 1990s in Sudan and was suspected in the October 2000 bombing of the USS Cole in Aden, in which 17 sailors were killed.

Earlier, US defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld would not say if the US military had played any role in the explosion. But noting al Harethi’s background, Rumsfeld told a Pentagon press conference “it would be a very good thing if he were out of business”.

A Yemeni official said the blast occurred at dawn yesterday. Tribesmen in the area, however, said it was Sunday afternoon.

“Authorities have been monitoring this particular car for a while and we believe those men belonged to al-Qaida terror network,” the official said.

Local officials refused to discuss the incident last night. Yemeni officials first thought the car blew up because the men were carrying explosives that may have been triggered accidentally.

However, tribesmen suspected the car came under attack although none interviewed claimed to have seen a missile or the actual explosion.

“I saw a helicopter hovering overhead and I heard an explosion,” one tribesman said, refusing to give his name. ”The car was on fire and the area around it was covered in smoke.”

Large parts of the car’s roof were blown away, and tribesmen said body parts had been thrown outside the vehicle. The remains were taken to a military hospital in San’a.

Rumsfeld yesterday described Yemen’s co-operation with the United States as “good”, noting the two countries had been sharing information.

“We have some folks in that country that have been working with the government and helping them think through ways of doing things,” he said.

On Sunday, a helicopter carrying employees of US oil company Hunt, based in Dallas, Texas, came under small-arms fire just after take-off, forcing an emergency landing at San‘a airport that slightly injured two people.

Authorities later said two men were arrested in connection with the shooting.

Beyond tribal disputes, Yemen long has tolerated Muslim extremists. It is also the ancestral homeland of bin Laden, accused of masterminding the September 11 attacks and the October 2000 blast on the USS Cole while it was refuelling in Aden.

Last month, a blast caused by an explosive-laden boat crippled a French oil tanker off Yemen, killing a Bulgarian crew member and spilling 90,000 barrels of crude oil.