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| Yemeni anti-government protesters © AFP Ahmad Gharabli |
CAIRO (AFP) – The turmoil in Yemen which has seen its veteran president seek treatment in Saudi Arabia after a bomb attack makes the local Al-Qaeda franchise “more dangerous”, the top US uniformed commander Admiral Michael Mullen said on Wednesday.
Al-Qaeda in Yemen “has grown into a very virulent deadly federated point in the Al-Qaeda organisation,” the chairman of the US joint chiefs of staff told a news conference on a visit to Cairo.
“It is incredibly dangerous and made more dangerous in the ongoing chaos.”
Yemeni President Ali Abullah Saleh, who was flown to Saudi Arabia for treatment on Saturday after an attack on his palace following five months of protests against his 33-year rule, has been a key ally in the US “war on terror”.
Yemen is the ancestral homeland of late Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden and the jihadists’ local affiliate, Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, is blamed for anti-US plots including trying to blow up a US-bound airplane on Christmas Day in 2009.
Mullen warned that any further deterioration of the security situation in the impoverished country might have global implications.
“The downside of a much more chaotic and much more violent Yemen is not just bad for Yemen, it’s bad for the region, it’s bad for the world,” he said.
“I would certainly urge leaders from every side of this challenge to be calm and try to resolve the issues peacefully,” he said.
Saleh was said on Wednesday to be in stable health as protesters pushed to form an interim ruling council.
Saleh, 69, would undergo a cosmetic operation to treat “light burns on the scalp,” a Saudi official said, adding that “reports on the deterioration of his health condition are baseless”.
© AFP — Published at Activist Post with license
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