AFP/Sanaa

Yemeni President Abd-Rabbuh Mansour Hadi insisted that a shooting that targeted the prime minister’s convoy was an “isolated act”, state news agency Saba reported yesterday.
Prime Minister Mohamed Basindawa escaped unharmed when gunmen opened fire on his convoy in the capital Sanaa on Saturday in an attack that left no casualties, a security source said.
Basindawa has headed a national unity government since December 2011 under a transition agreement paving the way for long-standing ex-president Ali Abdullah Saleh’s ouster.
“Opening fire at the prime minister’s convoy is an individual, isolated, unacceptable and condemned criminal act which will be dealt with firmly,” Hadi said, quoted by Saba.
According to security officials, Al Qaeda, accused of having assassinated members of Yemen’s security forces in addition to several failed attempts to kill the defence minister, was not linked to Saturday’s attack.
Basindawa was travelling in an armoured car when four gunmen in a four-wheel drive opened fire before fleeing, the security source said on Saturday.
It was the first such attack to target the premier, who was a leading opposition figure under Saleh.
Elsewhere, an unknown group yesterday attacked a key pipeline in Wadi Abida in the eastern Marib province, bringing oil flow from the line to a halt, the defence ministry’s website 26sep.net reported.
Tribesmen from Marib have attacked the pipeline to pressure the central government in Sanaa to release several of their arrested comrades.
Apart from tribal feuds and the Al Qaeda threat, Yemen is also caught in a power struggle with southern separatists and faces a rebellion in the mostly-Shia populated north.
The government on August 21 apologised to both southern separatists and northern rebels for wars against them, as part of efforts to encourage national dialogue aimed at drafting a new constitution and holding elections.
Yemen is the ancestral home of Al Qaeda’s late founder Osama bin Laden and the home base of the militant faction’s local front group, Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula.