Ibrahim al-Asiri (Photo taken from CNN Video)
(CNN, April 22, 2014) — The United States offered extensive assistance beyond drone strikes during a massive anti-terror operation in Yemen, including flying Yemeni commandos to a site where they killed scores of suspected al Qaeda members, a U.S. official said.
U.S. personnel wore night-vision gear and flew Russian-made helicopters to bring Yemeni forces to a remote, mountainous spot in southern Yemen, according to the official. There, the Yemeni commandos engaged suspected members of al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula.
The U.S. official would not specify whether the American personnel involved were among the U.S. military’s special forces, worked for the CIA or were contractors. Whoever they were, the official said that none of the Americans took part in actual combat on the ground.
DNA tests are being conducted to determine if one of the most well-known members of that group — bomb maker Ibrahim al-Asiri — is among the dead, according to Yemeni officials.
A high-level Yemeni government official told CNN that al-Asiri is among those suspected to have been killed in a firefight Sunday between militants and Yemeni forces.
The official’s comments are the first public acknowledgment that al-Asiri could be among the dead.
The DNA tests are not due back for several days, the official said.
