WSJ: The Obama administration has given the Central Intelligence Agency and U.S. military greater leeway to target suspected al Qaeda militants in Yemen with drones, responding to worries a new haven is being established from which to mount attacks on the West.

The policy shift, as described by senior U.S. officials, includes targeting fighters whose names aren’t known but who are deemed to be high-value terrorism targets or threats to the U.S. The White House stopped short of authorizing attacks on groups of lower-level foot soldiers who are battling the Yemeni government, the officials said.

Related: Yes they are apparently all over it. US drones strikes kill 25 in Yemen overnight:

US drones raided several hideouts of the Yemen-based Al-Qaeda wing in the southeast restive province of Al-Baydha on Friday night. At least 25 AQAP militants were killed, including senior figures, with several other militants being wounded in an air strike conducted by the United States forces according to local website news…Moreover recent news that al-Shaba’a, the Ethiopian al-Qaeda wing had sent hundreds of Jihadists over to Abyan to join in Ansar al-Sharia, has been the cause of great concerns for both the government and the civilian population, as they feel their land could become the ground of a mighty war.

Ethiopians? al Shaba’a? 1) Maybe these are the nine mystery ships that everyone is talking about arriving before last Sunday’s attack on the military base in Abyan that killed nearly 200 Yemeni soldiers and 2) How weak is AQAP that they need to import fighters?

There’s also reports of drone strikes in Jaar, Abyan that destroyed the military equipment AQAP captured from the army last week-end. Update: The al Baydah airstrikes hit the AQAP training camp and targeted local al-Qaeda leader Abdulwahhab al-Homaiqani, the BBC reports. Its always good when there are no immediate reports of civilian casualties, I would have heard by now.

The Yemeni soldiers captured (who weren’t beheaded or otherwise mutilated) were paraded around Jaar, forced to train the terrorists on how to operate the tanks, and now are threatened with execution if the govt doesn’t release AQ prisoners.

The YO article regarding reports of an impending attack follows: Yemen Observer:

Yemen based al-Qaeda plans strikes on Sana’a and Mukala Reliable sources have said that al-Qaeda has been preparing for its largest operations yet in the capital city of Sana’a, operations aimed at strategic sites including military and security installments and embassies.

Sources said that al-Qaeda cells in the areas of Zindan and Arhab have trained for operations involving the storming of fortified sites, attacking fixed and mobile targets while aboard vehicles and motorbikes, and that al-Qaeda militants have entered Sana’a in preparation for carrying out their attacks in the coming few days.

The sources expect that al-Qaeda’s potential targets include the Airbase in Sana’a, the Interior Ministry, Republican Guard units and a number of embassies, including the American embassy.

The sources confirmed information regarding intentions by al-Qaeda to attack Mukala to divert attention its plans in Sana’a.

Security sources said that over 400 al-Qaeda militants are currently in Shabwa’s Azan Directorate, with three al-Qaeda leaders in charge (Ibrahim al-Bana, an Egyptian, Qasem al-Rimi and Shaker Hamel) of plans to attack vital installations, security sites, and important government facilities as part of a plan to expand their so-called Azan Islamic state to Mukala.

This coincides with the arrival of militants from the Somali al-Shabab al-Muslim to Yemen to support local al-Qaeda elements. Citizens in the coastal Shagra town said that they saw about 300 armed African men traveling from Azan to Zinjubar.

On its website, the Interior Ministry emphasized the government’s ability “to confront such adventurous terrorist plans, which show the true confusion of al-Qaeda, that knows that their end is eminent in Yemen in light of tendency of the restructure of the army on national basis and the comprehensive national dialogue in compatibility with the scheduled provisions of the operational mechanisms of the GCC initiative.”

In preparation for the attacks on Mukala, the Interior Ministry ordered their leadership in Hadramout and Shabwa to step up security precautions at all checkpoints leading to the two governorates and to stay prepared to face any terrorist actions.

Field sources in Abyan, in southern Yemen, said that the 111th Brigade in Lawder shelled heavy artillery trucks suspected of carrying weapons to al-Qaeda when they passed Akad area, to the east of Lawder.

A source said added that one of the trucks was hit but that they didn’t learn the extent of the damage caused, as they were in an area under al-Qaeda control. The source said that information indicated the trucks were carrying weapons to al-Qaeda fighters in Hadramout.

The interior Ministry said it had received information that armed al-Qaeda fighters were arriving in Yemen and that the ministry had taken measures to prevent them from entering Yemeni territories.

The cabinet held an extraordinary meeting on Wednesday to discuss the challenges posed by terrorist forces in certain governorates, and especially the savage attack in Abyan which killed over 120 soldiers and officers from army and security forces.

The Cabinet overlooked a report that included details of the incidence from the Defense Minister, as well as details of other terrorist activities carried out by al-Qaeda in Hadramout, al-Baidha, Shabwa and Aden.

The cabinet also stressed the need for the unification of security and military efforts, and elaborated on visions and plans “to face and defeat the evil forces to restore security and public tranquility.”

The Cabinet urged the Military Committee to accelerate their practical procedures to restructure the armed and security forces.

The Council of Ministers has ordered governors and military and security officials to live up to their commitments, and stressed that the government would hold accountable and take measures against those who fail to meet their responsibilities.

The Cabinet approved the formation of a ministerial committee consisting of the Ministers of Defense, the Interior, Local Administration, Justice and the Civil Services, to take charge of adopting all necessary measures to achieve stability and security and to investigate security defects, and to investigate events in Abyan. The committee has been directed to submit immediate reports to the cabinet so that it may take measures to deal with the situation.

The Cabinet said the government would not hesitate to take all measures to deter and eradicate terrorism and extremism of all sorts and forms. “We will provide all support to the military and security forces to carry out their duties, so as to enhance security and stability and eliminate terrorism,” read a statement issued by the cabinet on Wednesday.

It asked clerics, imams, and intellectuals to inform the public of Islamic rules that refute extremism and terror and prohibit the killing of innocent people under the pretence of serving Islam and of implementing Islamic rules, as is claimed by terrorist groups.

Meanwhile, local sources in Abyan said on Monday that al-Qaeda is forcing detained soldiers to train its militants on the use of modern tank, artillery units and other heavy weapons that it seized after attacking troop positions last Sunday in south Yemen.

About 60 soldiers were detained and taken to the Taliban-style, al-Qaeda-declared Islamic Emirate of Ja’ar in the southern province of Abyan on Sunday morning. More than 110 soldiers were killed and more than 150 other injured when al-Qaeda operatives attacked camps and positions in Dawfas area, near Zinjubar, the capital of Abyan.
About 20 al-Qaeda fighters were killed and dozens were injured, according to sources in Ja’ar.

Security sources have revealed that among those killed was Mohammed al-Haniq, the emir of al-Qaeda in the Arhab district.

“On Monday in Ja’ar, detained soldiers from the Dawfas battles were witnessed training al- Qaeda fighters on the use of looted tanks and artillery units under gun point,” said local sources.

Although American and Yemeni fighters jets tried to bomb the seized heavy weaponry on Sunday, they failed to destroy everything, said sources.

Newly-elected president Abdu Rabu Mansour Hadi vowed to crush all terrorist hideouts in Abyan and other places.

“The confrontation will continue with all force until the last terrorist is killed,” said President Hadi in a meeting on Monday with American, British, and Saudi officials and diplomats.

The country’s Supreme Military Committee also held a meeting with 10 Arab and Foreign ambassadors who assisted Yemenis in extracting themselves from their political crisis to discuss further serious confrontations with al-Qaeda.

In a statement released to media outlets on Monday, the families of dead and injured soldiers demanded that newly-elected President Hadi should strike with an iron fist those responsible for the massacre in Dawfas.

The families demanded that the Minister of Defense and Interior Minister resign and that an investigation committee be formed.

Meanwhile, six al-Qaeda suspects in possession of a car bomb were arrested early Monday morning in Sanaa, according to security authorities. Earlier in the week, another car bomb was discovered and confiscated. Authorities had been looking for three car bombs made in the Arhab area, about 30 km north of the capital. Arhab is the home district of extremist cleric Abdul Majid al-Zandani, who has been accused by the United States and the United Nations of being a global terrorist.

Last Wednesday, February, 29, al-Qaeda threatened to attack places outside the battlefield if government troops failed to withdraw from the vicinity of Zinjubar within ten days.

“We, Ansar al-Shariah in the State of Abyan, give the government an ultimatum of 10 days to withdraw all troops from around Zinjubar, and to compensate the displaced persons,” said Abu Hamzah Jalal Beledi, emir of Ansar al-Shariah in the State of Abyan, in a statement sent via SMS by one of his assistants, who called himself Abu al-Waleed.

“If the troops are not withdrawn, we will attack outside the battle field, and we might have to implement the ‘flooding river’ plan,” said the leader of al-Qaeda in Zinjubar.

The al-Qaeda threat came only two days after local military command issued an ultimatum of one week for Al-Qaeda operatives to leave the city of Zinjubar, with the threat that troops would storm the city if this did not happen.

Because the YO, YT, News Yemen and many others have lost their archives over the years, I usually copy the whole text of important articles.

With the recent uptick in AQAP activity and growing territorial occupation, people too poor to flee al Qaeda are terrified of both AQ and drone attacks. Hopefully this statement by AG Holder represents a real and ongoing commitment by the Obama administration to the principle of civilian immunity and US respect for the value of Yemeni lives.

AQAP does not follow the rules of war, and uses human shields, sheltering in civilian populated areas. The US has been targeting vehicle convoys, not towns. The shelling in Zinibar was from the Yemeni military, not US drones.

After grave US errors like al Mahfad (and the utterly shameful US statement that nearby Bedouins and their children were guilty of material support for selling vegetables, although the villagers had appealed to local authorities to expel the terrorists) and Saleh’s murder of his political enemy Sheik al Shabwani via US drone, visible US drones make parents very concerned. At the same time, the drones have been visible in Marib and many other locations since 2010, and I would think they are collecting surveillance photos.

I think/hope/pray the US understands that these are unwillingly occupied towns, that intel from the Saleh family is entirely unreliable, the CT units have been partially subverted by AQ and that in all cases, children under 14 cannot be terrorists.

The attitude of Yemenis is that al Qaeda should be captured, given a fair trial and imprisoned if there is actual evidence of crimes. They do not oppose counter-terror operations per se but summary execution without trial, just like many Americans who raised objections over Awlaki and Khan.

Boston Herald: Speaking at Northwestern University law school, Holder gave the most complete explanation to date of the Obama administration’s legal rationale for killing people like U.S.-born Anwar al-Awlaki, who was targeted in an airstrike in Yemen last year.

Such killings can be ordered “in full accordance with the Constitution” but require “at least” an imminent threat in a situation where capture is not feasible, and when the strike is “conducted in a manner consistent” with the rules of war, Holder said.

The lawfare summary brings up another issue though, “a senior operational role,” which presupposes that the US knows who it is droning. While the criteria Holder outlined is for deliberate targeting of US citizens, it would be nice to think that the US has some clue as to the names of its Yemeni targets and doesn’t just look for random gatherings of bearded men. In Yemen, the most accurate fatality listing of US drone strikes comes from al Qaeda itself, and the Yemeni government announced Qasim al Reimi was dead four times.

While I imagine there are vast challenges to intelligence gathering on AQAP, it is this imprecision that can lead to collateral damage or more accurately, dead children. I still haven’t gotten over the photos of the crucifixion of the “spies,” but logically a modicum of respect for southerners as southerners in general would go a long way. The language of SD spox Victoria Nuland’s Press Briefing 3/5/12 blew southerners minds, and she probably had no clue how very poorly and furiously it would be received.

via Lawfare’s summary: That is, the speech asserts that Due Process permits targeting of a citizen at least when the target is:

(i) located abroad rather than in the United States,

(ii) has a senior operational role

(iii) with al Qaeda or an al Qaeda-associated force,

(iv) is involved in plotting focused on the death of Americans in particular,

(v) that threat is “imminent” in the sense that this is the last clear window of opportunity to strike,

(vi) there is no feasible option for capture without undue risk, and

(vii) the strike will comply with the IHL principles of necessity, distinction, proportionality, and humanity.

What is the acceptable metric of civilian causality per each suspected al Qaeda targeted? Much, much lower than Afghanistan I hope. Its a very volatile situation.

US officials’ statements alienating southerners en masse (al Qaeda’s unwilling captive and nearby communities) isn’t helping overall efforts.

US and Yemeni officials have agreed to restart a controversial military-training program to help the new president tackle Al Qaeda militants as part of planned enhanced counter-terrorism relationship.

While President Abdrabuh Mansur Hadi has openly turned to Washington as he attempts to get the upper hand over the terrorist group, his policy may have a key drawback — upsetting the delicate political balance of power in the country and complicating the sensitive task of overhauling the nation’s fractured security forces.

Dozens of US special operations forces already on the ground are set to resume training of counterterrorism forces after a lull last year amid a wave of new sophisticated assaults by the Yemeni branch of the terrorist group and loosely linked jihadi groups. FOX

That may account for the US closing its investigation of Anwar’s connections to the “blind sheik” Omar Abdel Rahman in 1999. Once Awlaki’s many ties to the 9/11 highjackers became clear, a JTTF San Diego investigation was reopened. But in 2002, US Attorney Gaouette rescinded an arrest warrant against Anwar for passport fraud, a day before he re-entered the US.

Anwar as a double agent for and a triple agent against the US might explain the utter communication breakdown between JTTF’s DC and San Diego offices on Awlaki’s email correspondence with the soon to be jihaddist murderer Nidal Hassan.

It might also explain why Awlaki was never charged with anything–not incitement, not conspiracy to murder, even after the Nigerian Abdumutallab said he met with Awlaki regarding the Dec 2009 airplane bombing plot hatched in Yemen. On the other hand, it could all be a string of incompetence and bad luck. I don’t know which would be worse.

News Rescue “In video, Lt.Col. Anthony Shaffer describes how Anwar al-Awlaki Was a triple agent, and an FBI Asset Before 9/11 on infowars. Anthony Shaffer is a U.S. Army Lieutenant Colonel who gained fame for his claims about mishandled intelligence before the September 11 attacks and for the censoring of his book, Operation Dark Heart.

Shaffer and the Able Danger team also uncovered intelligence of an impending al Qaeda terror plot in the Gulf of Aden in the weeks immediately prior to the bombing of the USS Cole on Oct 12, 2000 in Yemen. Able Danger tried strenuously to issue a warning that, like DIA analyst Kye Fallis’ was thwarted.

Despite the NSA’s constant and years long monitoring of the Yemen hub and the CIA’s surveillance of the 2000 Malaysia meeting where both the Cole attack and 9/11 were planned, no intelligence warning on the Cole bombing was generated or forwarded from those agencies either. (The CIA later withheld info on the Malaysia meeting from the FBI as it was investigating the Cole, leaving connections to the impending 9/11 attack unexplored.)

Lt. Shaffer was black balled by DIA after he went public with the 9/11 Commission’s failure to include his testimony regarding the presence of Atta in the US. Commander Lippold was essentially forced to retire by DOD. Fallis quit DIA on the day of the Cole bombing.

The Malaysia meeting was attended by current AQAP leader Fahd al Quso and top AQ operatives from several nations. As I’ve been saying for nearly a decade, al Quso’s unique threat level comes from his operational experience (blowing up a warship) coupled with his international connections and credibility.

Al Quso was indicted on over 50 counts of terrorism in NY’s Southern District in 2003 following his 2002 escape from Aden jail. The Sanaa regime secretly released al Quso in May 2007 despite a ten year sentence handed down after his 2004 “recapture,” the Washington Post reported. Al Quso finally made it to the MWT list in Nov 2009 and was designated Specially Designated Global Terrorist by the US State Department in Dec 2010.

The US began its drone campaign in Yemen with strikes in Dec 2009, where Awlaki and other AQAP leaders were supposedly meeting at Fahd al Quso’s farm. Al Quso gave several media interviews recently, noting how lovely things are in the AQ occupied towns in Yemen, when they are not crucifying spies, beheading soldiers, looting banks and dehanding teen-agers. Yesterday, AG Holder, the bastion of flex-fit jurisprudence, gave the Obama administration’s rationale for targeting US citizens with drones.

Update: Gah! Must be something in the air. Fox: Mueller grilled on FBI’s release of al-Awlaki in 2002 (3/7/12)

The warrant was pulled by a judge in Colorado, after the cleric entered the U.S. A U.S. attorney in Colorado who oversaw the warrant and the Justice Department claimed the cleric’s earlier lies to the Social Security Administration, the basis of the charge, had been corrected. But new documents obtained by Fox News through the Freedom of Information Act show otherwise.

After al-Awlaki re-entered the U.S. in the fall of 2002 with the FBI’s help, the cleric then appeared in a high-profile investigation, in which Agent Ammerman was a lead investigator. The FBI has not made the agent available to Fox News to interview, nor has the Department of Justice made the U.S. attorney on the case available. Former FBI agents say Ammerman would have needed permission from higher up in the bureau to let al-Awlaki go.

The House Homeland Security Committee launched an official investigation into the cleric and his 9/11 connections last year, but sources tell Fox News that committee staffers have been frustrated by the FBI’s resistance to providing documents and witnesses, citing “ongoing investigations.”

Wolf urged the FBI director to brief other lawmakers, including the head of the house intelligence committee, so that a similar scenario “never happens again.”

Fox News confirmed that the October 2002 incident and the arrest warrant for al-Awlaki was never disclosed to the 9/11 Commission or to Congress.

Former FBI agents, familiar with al-Awlaki’s re-entry in October 2002, say only two scenarios seem to explain what happened. The FBI was tracking the cleric for intelligence or the FBI was working with the cleric and saw him as a “friendly contact.”

SANA’A — Abd Rabbu Mansour Hadi used to be known as a silent man who never objected to, let alone disobeyed, any of Ali Abdullah Saleh’s orders.

This manner of managing the country resulted in the peaceful youth revolution, which began in February of 2011 and which led to Hadi becoming Yemen’s new president.

Hadi departed from the south with Ali Naser Mohamed after the January 1986 war between leaders of the Aden’s Socialist Party. He and Mohamed left for Sana’a after they suffered defeat in Aden.

In the 1994 war, Hadi sided with Saleh against the secession movement which surfaced in the same year and which, by year’s end, was aligned with Saleh. During the outgoing president’s 33-year rule, Hadi received the respect of all parties, due largely to a perception that he kept his hands clean of political and moral corruption.

Yemen’s peaceful revolution has gone through various phases and ups and downs to reach a political settlement to respond to demands for change.

The international community’s involvement as a third party in the process may at least allow people to feel safe from Saleh and his family, who showed no signs of aspiration for change.

The February 21 election will not be democratic in any philosophic sense; it is more a consensus caesarean operation to end the 33-year-long family-dictatorial period of rule. And the more votes there end up being, the more strength Hadi will possess to rule.

The over $ 48 million which has been spent to hold the election has not been wasted. There is one candidate and the result is already known, but act of voting will be akin to taking revenge against Saleh and his aides.

Since the article was written, Field Marshal Saleh appointed General Hadi to the rank of Field Marshal.

The National: Mr Hadi was born in Thukain, a small village in the southern Abyan Governorate. He graduated from Britain’s Royal Military Academy Sandhurst in 1966 and then quietly rose through the military ranks of the then independent, Communist south, the People’s Democratic Republic of Yemen.

In 1986, a brief civil war in the south convinced Mr Hadi to defect to the north. Mr Saleh, then North Yemen’s leader, made him his personal military adviser.

The two briefly fought each as rival military commanders over the city of Taiz in 1972. But Mr Saleh found use of Mr Hadi’s military skills and knowledge of the south, appointing him defence minister in 1994. That was when Mr Hadi helped crush the south’s attempted secession from the union.

Although that made him few friends in the south, he was rewarded by Mr Saleh with the vice presidency in October 1994.

Since then, observers say he has done little.

I agree that the “US has always gotten it wrong in Yemen.” Its not just Obama, but rather a deep and fundamental misunderstanding of Yemen that stems back through the Krajeski era. There was never a good baseline and the echo chamber effect compounded errors as uninformed or misinformed analysis led to wrong conclusions and outcomes time after time. Perhaps it was the total isolation of the embassy personnel as their reality was shaped by the Saleh propaganda machine and prior misconceptions. In an interview regarding the piece at Democracy Now:

Scahill reports that U.S. drone strikes, civilian drone casualties and deepening poverty in Yemen have all contributed to the cause of an Islamist uprising and how the U.S. has always “gotten it wrong” in Yemen.

In the interview, Scahill says that, “The arrogance of the U.S. was always thinking that whatever U.S. official was sent to Yemen was smarter than Ali Abdullah Saleh. … [Saleh] was a master chess player and he milked counter-terrorism as his cash cow. [U.S.-supplied] forces have almost never been used to actually battle anyone determined to be terrorists. They’ve existed primarily for the defense of the Saleh regime.”

He goes on to highlight the difference in perspectives between the U.S. and the actual Yemeni people, “One tribal leader who said very clearly,’al-Qaeda’s a terrorist organization. Yes these guys want to destroy America’…’you consider them terrorists. We consider the drones terrorism.’”

Watch it here:

Boston Herald: MIAMI — Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh is in the United States with full diplomatic immunity, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s legal adviser has written the Pentagon, and should not be compelled to provide sworn testimony for the Guantanamo war court.

State Department legal adviser Harold Hongju Koh wrote the letter Monday to the Pentagon’s chief war crimes prosecutor, Army Brig. Gen. Mark Martins, opposing a request for a subpoena by lawyers for an alleged al-Qaida bomber facing a tribunal at the U.S. Navy base in southeast Cuba.

Saleh, 69, arrived in New York late last month and checked into the Ritz-Carlton Hotel. The U.S. granted him entry for medical treatment of burns he suffered in a June attack at his palace mosque in the uprising to oust him from power.

Lawyers for Guantanamo captive Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, 47, argue that Saleh could provide critical evidence in the capital case. Al-Nashiri, who was waterboarded by the CIA, is accused of orchestrating al-Qaida’s suicide bombing of the USS Cole off Aden, Yemen. Seventeen U.S. sailors died in the attack that crippled the warship in October 2000.

U.S. investigators descended on Saleh’s nation after the attack to collect evidence for several U.S. terror prosecutions.

But al-Nashiri defense lawyer Richard Kammen said there’s public evidence that Saleh “sought to limit the investigation of the Cole bombing,” that “he personally handled evidence” and “members of his government are alleged to be complicit in the Cole bombing.”

Koh did not address the value or content of the testimony that Saleh might provide in the three-paragraph single page letter obtained by The Miami Herald on Wednesday.

His letter also makes no mention of Saleh’s medical treatment.

Rather, Koh invoked “the particular importance attached by the United States to avoiding compulsion of an oral deposition of President Saleh in view of international norms and the implications of the litigation for the Nation’s foreign relations.” He did not describe those implications in the letter.

Koh asked Martins to convey his analysis to the chief of the Guantanamo judiciary, Army Col. James Pohl, al-Nashiri’s trial judge, that “President Saleh, as the sitting head of state of a foreign state, is immune while in office from the jurisdiction of the Military Commission to compel his oral deposition.”

Defense lawyers disagree. In U.S. v. Nixon, Kammen said, the 1974 Watergate case found “a sitting president of the United States was not immune from questioning in a criminal case.”

One link: Alsahwah.net – UN Envoy Jamal Benomar has affirmed to the leader of Houthi group Abdul-Malki Al-Houthi that his group must take part in the presidential elections, otherwise it would be included in the list of terrorist groups, AFP quoted sources close to Benomar .

Some southerners will boycott peacefully as they think voting will reaffirm unity. The Beidh allied faction said they will violently prohibit voting, and there was more violence in the south today. I am starting to understand the earlier Nuba statement waring about Iranian influence in the south.

From Nasser Arrabyee today: This violent group is refused by the majority of the separatists and it is loyal to the German-based former president of the south, Ali Salem Al Beidh, who is reportedly receiving support from Iran. Al Beidh said a several times over the years that he would turn to Iran if he did not get western support. I couldn’t imagine he was that stupid. Maybe I should have.

Hassan Zaid said in an interview that there was an explicit threat from the western nations that if they did not sign the GCC deal, the protest squares would become a blood bath like Syria. It was not a prediction, an analysis or an implication; Zaid says it was an overt threat. The ambassador has said many shocking, aggressive and undiplomatic statements, so the benefit of the doubt is gone. Its also pretty ironic the US ambassador is lamenting foreign intervention after imposing the GCC deal despite public objections and while leaning on the wrong faction.

al Sahwa: Alsahwah.net- The US Ambassador to Yemen Gerald Feierstein has expressed sorrow at foreign intervention in Yemen, pointing out to the Iranian support to the Houthi group.

“We would be so worried about any foreign interventions in Yemen that aim at raising security or political troubles,” he said In an interview with a Yemeni state-run TV.” We are so concerned about the Iranian attempts to undermine stability and security in Yemen.”

He had renewed the attitudes of his country toward the power transfer and the efforts of the political settlement under the GCC-deal and working with all political parties to sustain the interim government.

This is really nauseating and indicates the whole thing is a total sham. The US hanging on to Saleh’s relatives and Saleh himself: Saba (Feierstein) criticized the protests within the government institutions, in particular military units, affirming the legal actions against any government leaders accused of corruption must be taken. “The accused should have the opportunity to defend themselves”, he underlined.

Regarding the President Ali Abdullah Saleh’s political activity, Feierstein said the US does not have any reservation about the President’s political activities after ending his current presidential term, via leading the General People Congress Party.

USA Today: According to court documents, Abdulmutallab spent months pursuing American-born Muslim cleric Anwar al-Awlaki in Yemen, where the two men eventually met and hatched out a plan to blow up an American airliner over U.S. soil on Christmas Day 2009. In the weeks leading up to the bombing attempt, the two men texted each other, spoke briefly on the phone and ended up spending three days together at al-Awlaki’s house planning the attack, the government wrote in court documents.

Al-Awlaki eventually led Abdulmutallab to a bomb maker, who trained the Nigerian defendant on how to ignite the bomb, according to court documents. It was al-Awlaki, the government says, who ultimately approved the martyrdom mission.

“Awlaki’s last instructions to him were to wait until the airplane was over the United States and then to take the plane down,” prosecutors wrote in court documents.

According to court documents, Abdulmutallab disclosed the details of his relationship with al-Awlaki in statements he gave to the FBI in 2010.

Al-Awlaki, who had become a leading al-Qaida figure in Yemen, was killed in a U.S. drone attack last year.

In 2009 while in Yemen, Abdulmutallab visited mosques and asked locals whether they knew how he could meet al-Awlaki, records show. Eventually, he met someone with a connection: the individual took Abdulmutallab’s cell phone number and gave it to al-Awlaki, who texted him shortly after.

Eventually, the two men met. Abdulmutallab successfully sold himself as an ideal candidate for a martyrdom mission, and a bomb maker was summoned, records show.

For two weeks, Abdulmutallab trained in a camp, where he received weapons instructions and indoctrination in jihad, records show. The bomb maker eventually delivered the bomb to Abdulmutallab and showed him how to use it, records show.