Digital News Report – While U.S. officials complain that Yemen is not doing enough to fight Al Qaeda in that country, Yemeni officials say that U.S. policies have alienated the government and did little to address the room causes of militancy.
The attempted attack on a U.S. airline on Christmas day illustrates the fact that Yemen has become the new front on terrorism. On December 17th a U.S. backed airstrike in southern Yemen killed at least 23 militants, according to a report by Sudarsan Raghavan with the Washington Post Foreign Service. Tribal leaders say that the strike killed civilians for the most part.
Some of the militants released by from the Guantánamo Bay prison camp have recently surfaced in YouTube videos along side Yemeni militants. This has prompted some U.S. Senators to call for a halt of the releases. “Guantánamo detainees should not be released to Yemen at this time,” said Dianne Feinstein. Feinstein is the senior Democrat on the Senate intelligence committee.
“The question is: are we going to take every step possible to keep our country safe? That means stop releasing Gitmo detainees now,” said Kit Bond, the top Republican on the committee.
Yemeni prisoners make up nearly half of the 198 prisoners at Guantánamo.
By Mark Williams