Reports:

Suspected US drones launch attacks in Yemen

Rasa - Suspected US drones have carried out more attacks in Yemen, according to residents.

News ID: 427932

Date: 06 March 2017 - 21:32

RNA - Residents said suspected US drones fired missiles at the house of a purported al-Qaeda suspect in the village of Noufan in central al-Bayda Province on Monday.

They added that a mountainous area believed to house a training camp in al-Saeed in Shabwa Province in southern Yemen was also targeted in what were likely US drone strikes.

Meanwhile, a Yemeni source was quoted by AFP on Monday as saying that a suspected US airstrike had hit the town of al-Nasl in the southern province of Abyan at dawn.

There were no immediate reports of casualties from any of the attacks.

The US has intensified its military engagement in Yemen.

On March 2, Washington launched a series of strikes against alleged al-Qaeda targets in Yemen. The military attacks focused on the southern provinces of Abyan and Shabwah as well as Bayda, farther to the north. The military operations were the first since a botched raid in January that killed women and children as well as an American commando.

Reports also said the Pentagon has quietly ordered fresh deployments of Special Operations troops to the Middle East and North Africa, which signals that the US military appears to be launching a more aggressive campaign against what it calls terrorist positions in Syria and some regions of North Africa.

Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) has grown in weapons and number since the start of a Saudi-led military campaign in Yemen, which was launched in March 2015 to bring back Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi — who has resigned as Yemen’s president — to power.

The terror organization has taken advantage of the chaos and breakdown of security caused by the US-backed, Saudi-led war to tighten its grip on the southern and southeastern parts of the crisis-hit country.

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