SANAA (AFP)
Yemeni tribesmen kidnapped two Japanese women holidaymakers on their way to a tourist site in the east of the country on Wednesday but the tribe's leader promised a swift release.
Sheikh Mohammed Hassan bin Muaili told AFP that the abduction by armed members of his Muaili tribe had not been sanctioned by him and that the perpetrators would be handed over to the authorities.
"They will be let free within the next hour. We are waiting for security authorities to come to take the two hostages," the tribal chief told AFP by telephone.
He condemned the abduction, saying that it was the "action of individuals."
Foreigners are frequently seized by Yemen's powerful tribes for use as bargaining chips in disputes with the central government.
More than 200 have been abducted over the past 15 years.
All have been freed unharmed except for three Britons and an Australian seized by Islamist militants in December 1998. They were killed when security forces stormed the kidnappers' hideout.
The two Japanese women were kidnapped as they traveled by road to the site of the ancient Marib Dam, a major tourism draw.
Sheikh Mohammed was spearheading negotiations with the kidnappers of the two Japanese, who he said were being held in the al-Wadi area of Marib, 170 kilometers (105 miles) east of the Yemeni capital.
The kidnappers were demanding the release by the central government of a member of the tribe, Malek bin Hassan bin Muaili, who had been detained on suspicion of involvement in an April 16 bombing which killed three policemen in Marib, the local official said. |
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Al-Qaeda Yemen is the ancestral homeland of al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden and the Marib region has seen violence by sympathizers of his network.
Last July, eight Spanish tourists and two local drivers were killed in a suicide bombing near Marib blamed on a local al-Qaeda cell.
U.S. operatives based in Djibouti, across the Bab al-Mandab strait in the Horn of Africa, have been discreetly assisting the Yemeni authorities in their battle against persistent Al-Qaeda-linked violence.
As long ago as 2000, an attack claimed by al-Qaeda on the destroyer USS Cole off the Yemeni port of Aden killed 17 sailors.
One of the world's poorest countries, Yemen also enjoys one of the world's highest rates of private gun ownership making it highly volatile.
The central government's writ extends only with difficulty beyond the major towns and in the countryside it has to contend with the power of the tribes. |
