ADEN, 8 April 2004 — US warships might resume refueling at the southern Yemen harbor this year, after more than three years of suspension following the bombing of USS Cole.
“We hope US ships would resume stopping here this year,” Brig. Gen. Mastin Robeson of the US-led anti-terror task force told reporters here yesterday.
He made the comments at a ceremony to launch seven patrol boats supplied by the United States to Yemen’s coast guard. The US official would not give an exact date.
The Cole was rammed by a small explosives-laden boat, led by two suicide bombers, as it was refueling in the Aden harbor on Oct. 12, 2000. Seventeen US sailors were killed in the attack.
Yemeni officials said last week that six suspected accomplices in the suicide bomb attack would go on trial this week. They said the first group of specialized patrol boats inaugurated yesterday was part of a plan to commission at least 50 boats to help secure the country’s 2,000 km coastline on the Red Sea and Arabian Sea.
