German embassy guard gunned down outside Yemen supermarket
A security guard employed by the German embassy in Sanaa, Yemen was shot as he was leaving a supermarket Sunday. It is the latest in a series of attacks against foreign and local officials, which bear the hallmarks of al Qaeda.
Policemen gather outside a supermarket after a shooting in Sanaa, Yemen, Sunday. A Yemeni security official says unknown gunmen killed a German embassy guard in an attack on a diplomatic vehicle outside a supermarket in the capital, Sanaa.
Hani Mohammed/AP
Sanaa, Yemen
Gunmen shot dead a German security guard employed by the聽's capital聽聽on Sunday as he was leaving a supermarket, Yemeni security officials said, in an attack they said bore the hallmarks of al Qaeda.
The guard was gunned down in聽's Hadda district, where the embassy is also based, the latest in a series of attacks on foreign and local officials in the US-allied state which is battling one of the most active branches of al Qaeda.
"He was leaving the market to go to his vehicle," one source said. Pan-Arab news channel al-Arabiya reported that the guard had been shot dead as assailants tried to kidnap the German ambassador聽, who escaped.
Embassy employees in聽聽and the German Foreign Ministry in Berlin declined to comment. Mueller-Holtkemper had only recently arrived in聽聽and presented her credentials to Yemeni authorities less than a week ago, a statement on the embassy's website showed.
-based al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) has attempted to attack several large Western targets, including airliners, and is believed to have been behind a series of killings of foreign and local officials in the country since 2011.
In November last year gunmen shot dead a Saudi diplomat and his Yemeni bodyguard in聽聽in an attack believed to be the work of the group. A month earlier, masked gunmen shot dead a Yemeni man who worked in the security office of the US Embassy in聽.
聽was one of several Western countries to close their聽聽embassies in early August after a US warning of a possible major militant attack in the聽. The mission reopened after a two-week closure.
罢丑别听聽was attacked in September 2012 by demonstrators angry at a film they said was blasphemous to Islam. Hundreds of Yemenis broke through the main gate of the heavily fortified compound, smashed windows of security offices outside the embassy and burned cars.
On Sunday AQAP said in a statement it was behind an attack on an聽聽base in the southeast of the country last week in protest at the聽's cooperation with the聽聽and vowed to continue its "holy war" against Yemeni forces.
Militants took advantage of political chaos in聽聽during the Arab Spring uprising in 2011 to seize control of some towns and surrounding areas in the south of the country. They were beaten back by Yemeni forces with assistance from the United States and dispersed into smaller groups spread across the south of the country.
Additional reporting by Boris Berner in Berlin, Writing by Sylvia Westall