SANAA, Yemen: Al-Qaeda in Yemen says a senior cleric was among four people killed in a recent US drone strike in the country’s south.

A statement posted Thursday on a Twitter account run by the group said Sheik Harith Al-Nadhari was among those killed in the Jan. 31 strike. Al-Nadhari was among the group’s few public faces and recently appeared in an Al-Qaeda video praising last month’s deadly attack by militants at the offices of a satirical French magazine.

The strike, first reported by Yemeni tribal and security officials, took place in Shabwa province. It was the second such strike in five days, something that was interpreted as a signal of Washington’s resolve to keep fighting the militants despite Yemen’s political paralysis, brought on by a Shiite rebel power grab.