AQAP is now just one of many armed groups, including Islamic State group militants and UAE-trained separatist militias [Getty/file photo]
A senior member of Al-Qaeda in Yemen has been killed in a bomb blast, according to a statement from the extremist group behind a string of high-profile attacks.
Abu Yusuf al-Muhammadi al-Hadrami died when a motorcycle packed with explosives detonated near where he worked in Marib, east of the rebel-held capital Sanaa.
“By God, we will not let your blood (be spilled) in vain,” said the AQAP statement, which was issued late Thursday.
Washington regards the group, known as Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), as the militant network’s most dangerous branch.
Born in 2009 from the merger of Al-Qaeda’s Yemeni and Saudi factions, AQAP grew and developed in the chaos of Yemen’s war, which since 2015 has pitted Iran-backed Houthi rebels against a Saudi-led coalition.
It has been responsible for multiple attacks, including the deadly 2000 bombing of the USS Cole off the coast of Aden, which killed 17 US military personnel.
In 2015, AQAP claimed that two French gunmen who massacred 12 people in an attack on the Paris offices of the Charlie Hebdo magazine were acting on its behalf.
AQAP is now just one of many armed groups, including Islamic State group militants and UAE-trained separatist militias, who are active in Yemen’s non-rebel areas.
