Two security officers killed in Yemen, Al Qaida suspected

Two senior Yemeni security officers were killed in separate attacks in Yemen's southeastern province of Hadramout early Sunday, a government official told Xinhua.

"Attackers suspected of belonging to the Al Qaida terrorist group killed a senior security officer by gunfire and an intelligence officer in an ambush in different areas in Hadramout province," the government official said on condition of anonymity.

The senior security officer was travelling in his own car when he came under a hail of bullets northwest of Hadramout and the intelligence officer was ambushed by "terrorists" in Ghail Bawazir region, he said.

An Al Qaida suicide car bomber Friday stormed a military base in Yemen's southern province of Abyan, killing at least 15 soldiers and injuring dozens of others.

Yemeni security services have repeatedly blamed militants of the Yemen-based Al Qaida offshoot for a series of attacks, mostly in the country's southern regions.

The Yemen-based Al Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, which emerged in January 2009, is considered the most strategic threat to the Yemeni government and neighbouring oil rich Saudi Arabia.