US intensifies ‘secret campaign of Yemen airstrikes’
EDWARDS AIR FORCE BASE, Calif. – The first 17 members of ACC are being trained by Edwards’ testers to learn how to fly the Global Hawk unmanned aerial vehicle. Training has been ongoing here for the past few months and is projected to be complete by midsummer. (Courtesy photo)
A power vacuum may be developing in Yemen as the country’s embattled president remains in Saudi Arabia. Ali Abdullah Saleh went there for medical treatment after he was injured in a bomb attack on his presidential compound. Meanwhile his forces remain in a stand-off with tribesmen determined to topple the Saleh regime and the government is also battling Islamic militants. On Thursday, Yemeni officials said government troops killed several suspected al-Qaeda militants in the country’s south. And in the middle of all that the New York Times reports that American drones and fighter jets have intensified a U-S campaign of air-strikes against militants. The paper’s national security correspondent Mark Mazzetti wrote the story.