U.S. Officers Kill Armed Civilians in Yemen Capital

[Comrade Grumpy]

3. "US Suspends Public Operations at Embassy in Yemen"

http://www.cnn.com/2014/05/07/world/africa/yemen-unrest/

Citing recent attacks, the United States on Wednesday announced that it has suspended public services at its embassy in Sanaa, Yemen.

"Due to recent attacks against Western interests in Yemen, we have temporarily suspended operations of our Embassy in Sana'a to the public," State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said in a statement. "We continue to evaluate the security situation every day, and we will reopen the embassy to the public once it is deemed appropriate." She described the move as a "precautionary step."

The temporary suspension of operations is due to a reemergence of a threat from several weeks ago that the United States thought it had disrupted, according to a U.S. official with specific understanding of the current situation. A credible threat to the U.S. Embassy emerged around March, the official said, in the same time frame that a video appeared showing some 100 al Qaeda operatives in Yemen, including several who had broken out of jail the month before.

The United States thought that threat had been disrupted by a number of Yemeni actions, including, but not directly related to a series of U.S. drone strikes and Yemeni military operations in early April. But in recent days, the threat stream has reemerged, the official said. It is currently assessed to be credible and somewhat specific in terms of the embassy being the target, according to the source. The United States is still attempting to corroborate the threat and determine whether there is a specific time and date, as well as any other specific locations.

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