Agencies/Aden

Mourners carry the coffin of Yemeni Shura Council speaker Abdulaziz Abdulghani during a funeral ceremony at the Al-Saleh Mosque in Sanaa yesterday. Abdulghani died in Saudi Arabia of injuries sustained in a June assassination attempt on President Ali Abdullah Saleh
Eleven Yemeni soldiers and 39 suspected Islamist militants were killed in some of the worst violence to grip the volatile south since mass protests began in January against President Ali Abdullah Saleh, residents and officials said.
A security official said yesterday the clashes broke out late on Tuesday when militants attacked troops stationed near Zinjibar, the capital of the volatile Abyan province, where militants, emboldened by months of upheaval, have seized at least three towns since March.
Warplanes targeting the attackers bombed the area and residents of the town of Jaar, some 15km away, said the sky was lit up by the raid.
Meanwhile, one army unit managed to force gunmen from a stronghold in the Maysameer district west of Zinjibar, a security official said.
“The militants withdrew, leaving behind weapons and materials they had previously looted from the army,” he said.
While Saleh recovers in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, from a June assassination attempt, the death toll in Abyan has been rising fast, with Islamist militants regularly attacking soldiers, security officials and tribesmen who are fighting to regain control over parts of Yemen’s south.  
A resident of Jaar said he had helped militants bury the bodies of the dead in a mass grave in the early hours of yesterday.
The US and Saudi Arabia fear upheaval in impoverished Yemen is giving the militants, who the government says belong to Al Qaeda, more room to launch attacks on the region and beyond. 
Opponents of Saleh accuse him of exaggerating the threat of Al Qaeda and even of encouraging militants in order to pressure Riyadh and Washington into backing him.
Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Mujawar said yesterday that officials injured during the attempt on Saleh’s life would be returning home “soon”.
Mujawar returned on Tuesday to Yemen after recovering from injuries he sustained during the attack on a presidential palace in Sanaa.
Twelve people were killed and 87 wounded in the June 3 assault.