SANAA, 4 May 2003 — Yemen has formally asked Pakistan to extradite a Yemeni citizen captured in southern Pakistan for alleged connections with the terror network of Al-Qaeda, Foreign Ministry officials said yesterday.

Waleed Muhammad ibn Attash, also known as Khalid ibn Attash was arrested in the Pakistani port city Karachi on Tuesday along with five other Al-Qaeda suspects.

The officials told DPA that Attash was wanted by Yemeni authorities for his suspected involvement in the October 2000 attack on the US destroyer Cole.

The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said he is one of five suspects believed to have been the masterminds of the warship bombing.

Seventeen US sailors were killed in the attack, when a small boat loaded with explosives rammed into the destroyer, which was anchored in the southern port of Aden for refueling.

Yemeni authorities are hunting a Yemeni national called Muhammad Hamdi Al-Ahdal, alias Abu-Asem Al-Ahdal, who is allegedly the top mastermind of the attack. The other alleged mastermind of the attack is Al-Qaeda’s chief of operations in the Arabian Gulf Abdul-Rahman Al-Nashiri, who was arrested in the United Arab Emirates in November 2002. Al-Nashiri is of Yemeni origin.

Two other alleged planners of the Cole bombing are Jamal Badawi and Fahd Al-Qafei, both Yemenis. They escaped on April 11 from a prison in Aden, 360 km south of the capital Sanaa. It was unclear whether they were among the five nabbed with Attash in Karachi.

Yemen has been cooperating with the United States since the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks in the struggle against international terrorism.

Last year, Yemen said it was holding 85 people for suspected connections with Al-Qaeda and the Islamic Jihad movement.

In a related development, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) said in a statement yesterday it had reopened its office in Yemen for the first time in six years.

The move was made in acknowledgement of Yemen’s support in the US-led war on terror, the statement said.

“The new USAID Office in Yemen will provide a development assistance component to the war on terrorism that is expected to produce positive results in Yemen,” said the statement.

The agency said its Yemen programs would focus on basic health care, primary education, increased income and food security in selected poor rural areas.

USAID has appointed Douglas Heisler as its representative in Yemen.

The agency withdrew its mission from Sanaa in Sept. 1996 in the aftermath of a civil war triggered by a secession attempt led by southern leaders.