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Yemeni president claims authorities knew of attack

Yemen's president said on Tuesday that security authorities knew al-Qaeda was plotting attacks in the impoverished country, after a suicide car bomber killed seven Spanish tourists and two local drivers.

"Yemeni security authorities had information that al-Qaeda elements were preparing to carry out terrorist attacks," President Ali Abdullah Saleh told reporters a day after the massive blast at an ancient temple site.

They "boosted security measures around oil facilities and government institutions, but the Balqis temple was not taken into account" as a potential target, he said.

A suicide bomber rammed a car packed with explosives into the Spanish tourists' convoy as they were wrapping up a tour of the temple in Marib, 170km east of the capital Sanaa.

The temple dates back 3,000 years, to the time of the biblical Queen of Sheba. The site has become a major tourist attraction since its significance was discovered in 1988, despite the threat of kidnapping by local tribesmen.

The bombing was the worst attack against Westerners in the Arabian peninsula country since al-Qaeda extremists struck the USS Cole off the southern port of Aden in 2000, killing 17 US sailors.

Spain's Onda Cero radio quoted survivor Maria Begona Larrabeiti as saying the experience was "an absolute nightmare."

"I saw the first car burning. In the second, people were in a bad state and, in mine, people were screaming," she said.

In addition to the nine people killed on Monday, six Spanish tourists, two Yemeni drivers and four police guards escorting the tourists were wounded.

No group has claimed responsibility.

"Preliminary information suggests the perpetrator of the attack was an Arab national," Saleh said without elaborating.

A security source said the bombing was apparently masterminded by al-Qaeda militants still on the run after escaping from a Sanaa prison in February last year.

At least three of the 23 al-Qaeda suspects who tunnelled out of jail remain at large after the others gave themselves up or were arrested or killed.

One of those still at large is Jamal Ahmad al-Badawi, convicted and sentenced to death for the Cole blast and featured on the US list of most-wanted terrorists with a US$5 million bounty on his head.

"Security agencies have upgraded their readiness to 100 percent to track down the elements involved in this criminal and irresponsible act," Saleh said.

Authorities are also hunting the escaped al-Qaeda militants, who number "three to four," he said.
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