SANAA, 17 October 2007 — The second most wanted Al-Qaeda militant convicted of masterminding the bombing of the US Navy destroyer Cole off Yemen in 2000 has surrendered to authorities, security officials and tribal leaders said yesterday.

The officials told Arab News that Jamal Mohammed Al-Badawi surrendered to security authorities in the southern province of Abyan on Sunday. They refused to give further details.

Tribal leaders in Abyan, contacted by Arab News, said Al-Badawi gave himself up to authorities after a deal brokered by Islamist leaders. They said that under the deal Al-Badawi would be released shortly after surrender on condition that he would stay away from terrorism-related activities.

Al-Badawi was among 23 Al-Qaeda operatives who escaped from a Sanaa jail in February 2006. He had been serving a 15-year sentence handed down by a state security court in 2005.

The men tunneled their way out of the prison in a mass escape that embarrassed the Yemeni government and dealt a major blow to its efforts to pursue supporters of the Al-Qaeda network.

Authorities said the men dug a 44-meter-long tunnel from their cell to a nearby mosque using steel food pots and cooking tools. They first dug three meters down from their cell floor and then continued toward the mosque, digging a tunnel measuring 60 by 80 centimeters.

Among the escapees were 12 others convicted of the Cole bombing and the attack against the French oil tanker Limburg in October 2002.

The Cole attack with a small explosive-laden boat at the southern Yemeni port of Aden left 17 US sailors dead and 32 others injured. Yemeni and US officials have blamed the attack on Al-Qaeda.

The main mastermind of the attack, Abdul-Raheem Al-Nashri, was tried in absentia and sentenced to death. He is reportedly in the custody of US authorities.

At least 14 of the escapees have been recaptured or gave themselves up to the authorities, including six convicted in the Limburg attack.

Among the jailbreakers was Qassim Al-Raimi, whom authorities accused of masterminding the car-bomb attack on a Spanish tourist convoy in Marib, some 190 km northeast of Sanaa last July. He is still on the run.

Yemen has aligned itself with the United States in the “war on terrorism” since the Sept. 11, 2001, attack and has rounded up hundreds of suspected al-Qaeda members and put them on trial.