Yemen Observer: http://www.yobserver.com
Posted in:
Front Page
Written By: Zaid al-Alaya’a
Article Date: May 3, 2008 - 5:26:57 AM
The Customs Training Institute was attacked this Wednesday and was hit by two mortar shells fired in Sana’a just 300 meters from the Italian Embassy with no injuries or losses reported, said a sources in the Interior Ministry.
Security forces rushed immediately to close off the area where the explosion took place. The building includes headquarters of Finance Ministry and Customs Administration. Investigations were carried out to learn details of the incident.
He added investigations were still going on to find out the perpetrators and their motives. Italian Ambassador Mario Boffo told an Italian television station that the explosion caused no damage or injuries inside the Embassy. The Interior Ministry also said no casualties were reported, as reported by the AP.
“We heard two strong explosions one after the other from the offices of customs authorities,” Boffo told Sky Tg 24 television. He said the customs office was about 500 yards away from the embassy and his residence.
An unidentified Interior Ministry official told Saba News Agency the Customs Authority in Sana’a appeared to be the target of the attack by unknown assailants. The shells landed in the courtyard outside the customs building.
In the same context, two police patrols in Lahj were subjected to shooting last Tuesday, one of the shooting was at the governorate center.
“The patrol managed to capture one of the armed men, however the other one was killed because he continued exchanging fire with the patrol,” reported an official statement.
The source confirmed that the man is being investigated for the reasons for their shooting at the police patrols, and to refer them to prosecution.
In the Sana’a, the attack on the Customs Authority is the four recent attacks. The last one was a bomb that exploded early on Thursday, April 10 outside the offices of a Canadian oil firm in Hadda Street, in the Yemeni capital Sana’a. The blast caused minor damage to the wall of the building of the largest oil company operating in Yemen, Canadian Nexen Petroleum. It caused no causalities according to eyewitnesses.
The Hadda incident came just days after another attack, attributed to al-Qaeda, on a residential complex housing western workers in Sana’a on Sunday, April 6.
Also, the attack on March 20, where three mortars missed the U.S. Embassy and crashed into a high school for girls nearby, killing a security guard and injuring 20 girls.
This prompted the US Embassy in Sana’a to release a statement on Tuesday that non-essential staff will be evacuated from Sana’a immediately.
The United Nations has since put up blast walls around its main headquarters and increased security other sites because of security concerns, officials have said.
The American Embassy also has issued a message urging citizens to exercise caution in areas of Sana’a where foreign companies have offices.
As a result of this, the Cabinet approved in its meeting on Wednesday, April 16 a anti-terrorism draft-law after it was revised and studied by a ministerial committee headed by the Interior Minister. This draft-law aims to enhance legal procedures and actions against terrorist crimes and determine their punishments that can reach capital punishment.
Anyone that may be found involved or accomplice in kidnapping, waylaying, looting public or private properties by force are to be punished with a sentence that can reach execution.
Third article of the draft-law specified terrorist attacks or acts in the frame of the draft-law are these crimes that include waylaying, plundering public and private properties, vandalisms of public roads, bridges, damps, electricity fixtures of high voltage, oil and gas facilities and the otherwise that are important and vital for the national economy. This is in addition that an act that can cause a threat or create terror amongst citizens and their belongings and properties directly or indirectly are considered as terrorism crimes, reported Saba news agency. The draft-law is to be referred to the parliament for study and approval before it is approved as a law by the President.
This approval of the anti-terrorism draft-law came after the several terrorist attacks that happened in the capital in the past three weeks that targeted foreign interests. These recent attacks also resulted in a visit of Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Robert Mueller on Wednesday, April 9, who met with President Ali Abdullah Saleh and discussed cooperation on War on Terror that the US started after September 11. Al-Qaida has an active presence in Yemen despite government efforts to destroy it. The group was blamed for the 2000 bombing of the USS Cole destroyer in the Yemeni port of Aden that killed 17 American sailors.