The U.S. State Department on Tuesday ordered non-essential personnel at the U.S. Embassy in Yemen to leave the country following the threat by al-Qaeda that has caused temporary shutdowns of 19 American diplomatic posts across the Middle East and Africa.
The department said in a travel warning that it had ordered the departure of non-emergency U.S. government personnel from Yemen “due to the continued potential for terrorist attacks” and said U.S. citizens in Yemen should leave immediately because of an “extremely high” security threat level.
“As staff levels at the Embassy are restricted, our ability to assist U.S. citizens in an emergency and provide routine consular services remains limited,” the travel warning said.
The State Department on Sunday closed 19 diplomatic posts until next Saturday. They include posts in Bangladesh and across North Africa and the Middle East as well as East Africa, including Madagascar, Burundi, Rwanda and Mauritius.
A U.S. intelligence official and a Mideast diplomat told The Associated Press that the shutdown of embassies was caused by an intercepted secret message between al-Qaida chief Ayman al-Zawahri and Nasser al-Wahishi, the leader of the Yemen-based al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, about plans for a major terror attack. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter publicly.
AQAP has been widely considered al-Qaeda’s most dangerous affiliate.
Even though the group lost U.S. citizen Anwar al-Awlaki one of its key inspirational leaders to a U.S. drone strike in 2011, al-Wahishi and the group’s master bomb maker, Ibrahim Hassan al-Asiri, are determined to target the U.S. and other Western interests.
The group is linked to the attempted Christmas Day 2009 bombing of an airliner bound for Detroit and explosives-laden parcels intercepted aboard cargo flights a year later both incidents involving al-Asiri’s expertise.
On Tuesday, Yemeni security officials said a suspected U.S. drone killed four alleged al-Qaida members in a volatile eastern province of the country. The drone fired a missile at a car carrying the four men, setting it on fire and killing all of them, the officials said.
The officials, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not allowed to talk to the media, said they believe one of the dead is Saleh Jouti, a senior al-Qaeda member.
