Friday papers

A YSP leader and his son were killed in Amran. The details are a little sketchy but it seems as though the two came under gunfire and were killed.

Husayn al-Jarabani has his report on al-‘Ujayri. The al-Jarabani report also mentions in a very confusing manner the arrest of another 18 individuals who were preparing to travel to Libya to celebrate the Prophet’s birthday, which would mean they were arrested a few weeks ago. He really doesn’t give much more information, but this Reuters report in al-Quds al-Arabi clears it up a bit. The Reuters report is heavily dependent on an article from al-Sahwa, which is here.

There is little in the way of actual details in the report, which relies on the testimony of one of ‘Abd al-Majid al-Zakhmi, who is the brother of one of the 18 detained. It doesn’t really seem as though the two are related and I have no idea as to why al-Jarabani linked them in the way that he did. Faysal Mukrim’s report in al-Hayat makes no mention of them, repeating the information about al-‘Ujayri.

One other side note is that on Wednesday President Salih appointed Ahmad al-Majidi as Yemen’s new ambassador to Libya after the last one, Husayn Ali Hasan, sought political asylum in the UK.

Still no word on the identity of Wednesday’s bomber, and also missing from this discussion is any link to al-Wahayshi or al-Raymi. Often the Yemeni government links the two to any and every attack, so why the silence now?