A key al Qaeda figure, Hussein al-Yemeni, involved in a recent attack on the CIA in Afghanistan, apparently has been killed in Pakistan, a U.S. counterterrorism official said yesterday.
Hussein al-Yemeni’s specialty was in “bombs and suicide operations” and he was suspected of playing “a key role” in a December attack at a U.S. base in eastern Afghanistan that killed seven CIA officers, the official said in an email, AFP reported.
Meanwhile, a court in Pakistan charged five young Americans yesterday with planning terrorist attacks there and conspiring to wage war against its allies, their defense lawyer said.
The men, all Muslims from the Washington suburb of Alexandria, Va., pleaded not guilty to five charges, the most severe of which carries a maximum sentence of life in prison, said lawyer Hasan Dastagir.
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The men, all in their late teens or early 20s, were charged by an anti-terrorism court inside a prison in Sargodha, where they were arrested in December.
They were reported missing by their families in November after one left behind a farewell video showing scenes of war and casualties and saying Muslims must be defended.
Their lawyer has said they were heading to Afghanistan and had no plans to stage attacks inside Pakistan.