ADEN: A drone strike killed three suspected Al Qaeda militants in Yemen late on Friday, a local official and a tribal source said yesterday.
Yemen is the main stronghold of Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), one of the Islamist militant group’s most active wings.
The strike targeted a vehicle in the Mafraq Al Saeed area of the Shabwa province in southern Yemen, which the suspected militants were travelling in, the sources said.
The United States acknowledges using drones in Yemen but does not oment publicly on the practice.
Wealthy Gulf neighbours and the West fear for the stability of Yemen, which shares a long border with the world’s top oil exporter, Saudi Arabia.
ROME: Italian sailors have recovered 10 bodies of migrants after their rubber dinghy sank off the Libyan coast, Italy’s navy said yesterday.
Thirty-nine migrants were rescued after the vessel sank on Friday afternoon some 40 nautical miles from the Libyan coast, the navy said, adding that the search for survivors continued yesterday.
A frigate and a patrol boat deployed to the scene, backed up by a helicopter and a merchant ship. An Italian tanker, which has picked up some 700 migrants from stricken vessels in recent days, along with the 10 bodies, is headed towards Sicily where it is expected early today, the navy said.
Also yesterday, the Italian coastguard rescued some 300 migrants thought to be Syrians, including 93 children and six women, from a fishing boat near Calabria in southern Italy.
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