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Dozens dead and injured after bomb explodes at Yemen police college Dozens dead and injured after bomb explodes at Yemen police college
(about 2 hours later)
A bomb has exploded outside a police college in Yemen’s capital Sanaa, killing and wounding dozens of people, police sources and residents said. A car bomb exploded outside a police college in Yemen’s capital Sanaa on Wednesday, killing about 30 people and wounding more than 50, police sources said, underscoring the country’s deteriorating security and a persistent al-Qaida threat.
Ambulances were transporting casualties away from the scene of the blast, which appeared to target a group of students outside the college, some of whose bodies were later seen lying in the street, witnesses said. Sectarian conflict after a 2011 popular uprising that led to a change of government and splits in the army has worsened since September when the Shia Muslim Houthi militia seized Sanaa.
The explosion was heard across the city and a large plume of smoke was visible in the area of the college. Al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), one of the group’s most active wings, had staged increasing numbers of attacks across Yemen before the Houthi advance and has carried out more bombings and shootings since.
Photographs purporting to show the aftermath of the explosion, distributed on Twitter, showed the mangled wreckage of a vehicle and bloodied people lying prone on a pavement, but the pictures could not be immediately verified. There was no immediate claim of responsibility for Wednesday’s bombing. Al-Qaida has in the past claimed they were behind similar attacks.
Officials were reported to have confirmed that a suicide driving a minibus was responsible for the explosion. The victims from the latest blast included students at the college and people waiting in line to enrol with the police, police sources said, as well as passers by.
Some reports said as many as 15 people had died. The explosion was heard across the city and a large plume of smoke was visible near the college in a heavily congested part of the city near the central bank and the defence ministry.
Security in Yemen has diminished since a 2011 popular uprising that led to a change of government and splits in the army. Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (Aqap), one of the movement’s most active wings, has staged a growing number of bombings and shootings across the country. “The situation is catastrophic. We arrived to find bodies piled on top of each other,” a paramedic at the scene told Reuters as ambulances took casualties away.
Western and Gulf Arab countries fear that further instability could weaken the country’s government, giving Aqap more space to plot attacks outside Yemen’s borders. “We found the top part of one person yelling, while his bottom half was completely severed.”
On 1 January a suicide bomber killed at least 26 people at a cultural centre in the central Yemeni city of Ibb in an attack that appeared to target the Houthi Shi’ite Muslim militia that seized the capital in September and advanced into other areas. A policeman told Reuters that another car had been passing as the bomb went off and was set on fire along with everyone inside.
The interior ministry said it was halting registration at the police college, which takes place every year, for a week.
Western and Gulf Arab countries fear that further instability could weaken the country’s government, giving al-Qaida more space to plot attacks outside Yemen’s borders. Yemen shares a long border with major oil exporter Saudi Arabia.
Yemen’s army has launched several concerted campaigns to dislodge al-Qaida with the help of US drone strikes, but the militants have proved capable of entrenching themselves in largely lawless parts of the country where it has sympathy from some Sunni tribes.