TEMPO.CO, Sanaa - Gunmen opened fire on the motorcade of Yemen's prime minister on Saturday but escaped unharmed, an aide said.The attack on Prime Minister Mohammed Salem Basindwa's convoy in the Yemeni capital comes after a senior intelligence officer was fatally shot in the country's south by unknown assailants.
Ali al-Sarari, a media aide to the prime minister, told The Associated Press the gunmen were riding in a vehicle without license plates and sprayed the speeding three-car convoy with bullets. Some of the vehicles were pockmarked with bullet holes but Basindwa escaped unharmed, he said.
Militants in Yemen have been behind a series of assassinations of security officers as the government battles with Al-Qaida militants who have mainly operated in the country's south.
Basindwa was appointed in late 2011 to head a coalition government comprised of ministers from both the opposition and officials from the regime of former President Ali Abdullah Saleh, who later stepped down in face of popular protest.
In nearly a year of turmoil, security collapsed in some parts of Yemen. Al-Qaida-linked militants also took advantage of the political unrest to reinforce their presence in some areas in the country's south.
On Saturday, security officials in Yemen said suspected Al-Qaida-linked gunmen shot and killed a senior intelligence officer, Hassan al-Mansouri, in the southern Lahj province. He had so far organized local tribes in a campaign to weed out the militants from the area.
AP | TRIP B