Drone strikes kill militants in Yemen; Americans urged to leave By Elise Labott and Mohammed Tawfeeq , CNN

A Yemeni soldier mans a checkpoint on a street
leading to the US embassy compound in Sanaa
on August 4, 2013.





(CNN) -- A pair of suspected U.S. drone
strikes killed four al Qaeda militants in Yemen
as the United States maintained a heightened
security alert in the country and urged all
Americans to leave immediately.
Security sources told CNN about the strikes
but didn't offer additional details. A Yemeni
official said four drone strikes have been
carried out in the past 10 days.
None of those killed on Tuesday were among
the 25 names on the country's most-wanted
list, security officials said.
It is unclear whether the strikes were related
to the added security alert in the country after
U.S. officials intercepted a message from al
Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri to operatives
in Yemen telling them to "do
something." The message was sent
to Nasir al-Wuhayshi, the leader of
al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula,
the terror group's Yemeni affiliate.
U.S. intelligence believes al-
Wuhayshi has recently been
appointed the overall terror
organization's No. 2 leader.
Also Tuesday, the State Department
urged Americans in Yemen to leave
immediately, citing terrorist
activities and civil unrest. All non-
emergency U.S. government
personnel were also told to leave.
Two U.S. military transport aircraft
landed in Yemen on Tuesday to
evacuate American citizens.
"In response to a request from the
U.S. State Department, early this
morning the U.S. Air Force
transported personnel out of Sana'a, Yemen, as
part of a reduction in emergency personnel,"
Pentagon press secretary George Little said in a
statement.
Little also said, "The U.S. Department of
Defense continues to have personnel on the
ground in Yemen to support the U.S. State
Department and monitor the security
situation."
The UK Foreign Office also announced it had
temporarily withdrawn all staff from the
British embassy and would keep the facility
shut until employees are able to return.
Washington takes precautions
Acting on the intelligence information, the
United States heightened its security stance,
issuing a worldwide travel alert and closing a
number of embassies and consulates over large
areas of the Middle East and Africa this week.
List of U.S. embassies and consulates closed
this week
The State Department said the substantial
security steps reflect an "abundance of
caution" over intelligence information that
indicated final planning by al Qaeda in Yemen
for possible terrorist attacks on Western
targets to coincide with the end of Ramadan
this week.
Three sources told CNN that the United States
has information that members of al Qaeda in
the Arabian Peninsula are in the final stages of
planning for an unspecified attack. Recent
jailbreaks in Pakistan, Iraq and Libya all have
the fingerprints of al Qaeda operations.
Prison breaks are among reasons for
heightened security
On Monday, White House spokesman Jay
Carney told reporters that U.S. anti-terrorism
efforts had decimated al Qaeda's global
leadership and greatly diminished its core in
Afghanistan and Pakistan, saying the threat had
"shifted to some of these affiliates, in
particular AQAP."
Separately, American special forces units
overseas have been on alert for the past
several days awaiting a mission to attack
potential al Qaeda targets if those behind the
most recent terror threats against U.S.
interests can be identified, a senior Obama
administration official told CNN.
The official declined to identify the units or
their locations because of the sensitive nature
of the information. Defense Secretary Chuck
Hagel put the units on alert last week, the
official said.
CNN's Barbara Starr and Hakim Almasmari
contributed to this report