Al-Qaeda inside the Yemen Government
Follow the bouncing ball.
1) The article below says the defecting Yemeni Ambassador says that al-qaeda within the yemeni security forces and govt were behind the Cole bombing in 2000
2) the 2003 Freedom House report Yemen says that Saleh refused to investigate the Cole bombing until the US threatened miliatary action.
3) The assasination of the Socialists leader in yemen was tied to one person only, and intl orgs and yemeni political groups say that this was orchastrated with people within the govt and the leadership of the Islah party together. The other suspects were released giving a green light to targeting other secularists.
4) If there are al-qaeda within the govt and they are being held back from making jihad on the US, what is the next logical thing they would want to do? Make a jihad on the shia of course.
a) close all the shia religious schools
b) trash all the shia religious libraries
c) outlaw shia religious celebrations
d) mass arrests
e) target invidual shia leaders for arrest
f) bomb them
g) drag burnt bodies through the streets
h) level villages
(all this within the last month,
documentation easily available.)
AFP via defense news: Yemen’s former ambassador to Syria, Ahmed Abdullah al-Hassani, alleged May 4 that al-Qaida cells within the Yemeni military and security forces planned the 2000 bombing of the U.S. destroyer Cole.
Hassani, who said he has applied for political asylum in Britain, also told a press conference in London that “it is very likely the head of the regime (President Ali Abdullah Saleh) knew in advance of the Cole explosion.”
However, Hassani provided no evidence to support his claims and said he had not been in contact with U.S. officials investigating the bombing since leaving Damascus to travel to London last week.
Hassani promised to disclose “more details” at some unspecified date.
Seventeen U.S. sailors were killed when two suicide bombers on an inflatable raft blew themselves up alongside the Cole in Yemen’s southern port of Aden in October 2000.
“It (the bombing) was not surprising because al-Qaida elements are at the top in Yemen, in the army and political security forces,” he charged.
Hassani said Saleh had dispatched his interior minister and political security minister from Sanaa, the capital, for Aden at midnight, hours before the bombing occurred, casting suspicion on the decision.
Hassani, who was commander of Yemen’s naval forces at the time of the bombing, said he was off duty in his home town just outside Aden.
While in Britain, Saleh is being looked after by the opposition Southern Democratic Assembly, which seeks self-determination for southern Yemen.
Flanked by opposition members, Hassani made a plea for self-determination, complaining of corruption and discrimination by the northerners who dominate the Yemeni government.
The British Home Office and Foreign Office have declined to comment on the case of Hassani, who said he had fled to Britain after an alleged assassination attempt by the Yemeni authorities.
