Al-Qaeda militants killed nine Yemeni soldiers Tuesday in an attack on a makeshift military post on a desert road in the country’s mostly lawless eastern provinces, a security official said.
“Al-Qaeda militants attacked a military position on the road between Hadramawt and Marib province (in the east),” the official said requesting anonymity, adding that “nine soldiers were killed” in the assault.
He said at least eight other soldiers were wounded.
Al-Qaeda gunmen attacked the soldiers just after dawn with “automatic weapons,” the official added.
The attack is the latest in a deadly week of battles between Yemeni security forces and Al-Qaeda linked militants that have strengthened their presence in the country’s south and east in the wake of the year-long uprising that eventually toppled former president Ali Abdullah Saleh.
A local official in the Abyan province town of Loder said Tuesday that Al-Qaeda militants have surrounded the area in preparation for the complete takeover of the town.
“Al Qaeda has distributed statements throughout the town saying that it is determined to take control of Loder,” said the official who requested anonymity.
At least 78 people were killed on Monday when Al-Qaeda militants raided barracks in Loder, 58 of them Qaeda militants.
At least 14 soldiers were killed in the raid, including an officer, while six other armed civilians loyal to the Yemeni army were also killed.
Two other armed civilians were killed Tuesday in Loder and six others wounded in sporadic clashes between Qaeda militants and the army, the local official said, adding that the Yemeni air force also “destroyed two tanks that were seized by al-Qaeda.”
In total, 80 people have been killed in Loder since Monday.
