4 Qaida Members Killed in Yemen Drone Strikes

Four suspected al-Qaida members were killed in drone strikes in central Yemen likely carried out by U.S. forces, a security source said Sunday.

The source, asking not to be identified, said three "armed fighters of al-Qaida" died when their vehicle was struck on Saturday in the Sawmaa region of al-Bayda province.

A drone strike on Friday killed a local military instructor for al-Qaida in the same province, he said.

The United States, which considers al-Qaida's Yemen-based franchise, Al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), to be its most dangerous, is the only force operating drones over Yemen.

But it only sporadically reports on a long-running bombing campaign against AQAP.

Al-Qaida and the Islamic State jihadist group have exploited a power vacuum created by the two-year-old conflict in Yemen between the government and Shiite Huthi rebels, especially in the country's south and southeast.