Yemen expelled 16,000 al Qaeda suspects?

Posted By Blake Hounshell Monday, June 16, 2008 - 11:32 AM Share

On Sunday, Yemen's defense minister told reporters that his country has expelled some 16,000 suspected al Qaeda members since 2005. If true, that's an astounding and disturbing figure.

What are we to make of his claim? I see a couple possibilities:

Yemen is/was crawling with potential terrorists.
Yemen's definition of who constitutes al Qaeda member is extremely broad.
Struggling to handle an influx of refugees from Somalia, Yemen finds it convenient to classify people as potential terrorists in order to deport them.

EXPLORE:MIDDLE EAST, AL QAEDA, TERRORISM

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RUFUSJSQUIRREL

11:33 PM ET

June 16, 2008

One, Two-hoo

Three.

JANENOVAK

6:00 AM ET

June 17, 2008

Migrants, they meant

The Yemeni government retracted the statement one day after it was made.

Jane Novak
http://armiesofliberation.com
http://janenovak.wordpress.com

BLAKE HOUNSHELL

7:03 AM ET

June 17, 2008

Thanks, Jane

It figures.

JANENOVAK

7:37 AM ET

June 17, 2008

FYI, on the subject of

FYI, on the subject of Yemen, later today three USS Cole families are going to issue a statement demanding Yemen re-imprison the convicted killers of their sons (al-Badawi and al-Quso) and release the imprisoned Yemeni journalist Abdulkarim al-Khaiwani.

Its really an impressive gesture that they included al-Khaiwani's freedom in their statement. As his friend I appreciate it, but it says something beyond him and Yemen and the al-Qaeda attack on the USS Cole.

Jane Novak
http://armiesofliberation.com
http://janenovak.wordpress.com

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