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Foreigners in Yemen see terrorism worries as overblown

07 January 2010 02:50 (UTC +04:00)

Baku â€“ APA. The problems the country faces are significant, they say, but they’re nothing new. Even Al Qaeda has been a presence for more than a decade, one man says, reported by Los Angeles Times (latimes.com)

Reporting from Sana, Yemen - Elena Rezneac’s lavender eye shadow shimmered in the sun outside a crowded Internet cafe in Yemen’s capital city. The 21-year-old Moldovan student giggled as she pushed her sunglasses up above her blond ponytail.

"If you read about Yemen in the news lately, you think there are terrorists running around and bombs in all the streets," she said. "But when you are here, it’s calm. I have to go online to remember there’s a war going on."

Others among the thousands of foreign aid workers and students of Arabic who live in this impoverished nation expressed a similar view.

The problems Yemen faces are long-standing and significant, they said, but at least on the surface, it’s not the nest of terrorism it seems in some Western media reports.

"It’s pretty much completely normal around here," said Ramon Scoble, a water management engineer for GTZ, a German development agency, who has lived and worked in Yemen for decades. "It’s not that the problems aren’t real. It’s that they aren’t new."

Yemen has been in the media spotlight since Christmas Day, when a Nigerian man who had studied Arabic in Yemen during the fall was stopped by fellow passengers as he allegedly attempted to set off explosives on a plane bound for Detroit from Amsterdam.

Responsibility for the attack has been claimed by the group Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, a branch of Osama bin Laden’s terrorist network that has prospered in Yemen in the last few years -- and been the target of air and ground raids by U.S.-backed Yemeni forces since mid-December.

The U.S., Japan and several European nations closed their embassies in Yemen in recent days because of security threats. The U.S. Embassy in Sana has since reopened, said Deborah Smith, a spokeswoman for the facility. She noted that no U.S. personnel had been evacuated from the country and that threats to -- and attacks on -- U.S. interests here go back at least a decade.

On Wednesday, Yemeni authorities announced the arrest of three men linked to the latest threats.

Yemen’s Al Qaeda wing first appeared on Washington’s radar in 2000 when a motorboat packed with explosives slammed into the U.S. destroyer Cole in the port of Aden, killing 17 sailors. In 2008, militants attacked the U.S. Embassy, killing at least 16 people, including an American.

The last three years have also seen attacks on tourists from nations including South Korea and Spain. Attacks on international aid workers have been rare, although in June the bodies of two German nurses and a South Korean teacher were found in a mountain hideaway of Islamic militants in northwestern Yemen.

Except for heightened security precautions, the constellation of aid and relief organizations here is operating normally.

"We have strengthened our security methods, but at this time, all essential services are still in place," said Andrew Knight, spokesman for the United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights in Yemen

At Sana coffee shops frequented by Westerners, rumors about possible attacks persisted Wednesday, but the mood remained calm.

Most of the foreigners who come to Yemen are here voluntarily, after all, to study and work. Some are attracted by the distinctive architecture, the ancient traditions, the crispness of the Yemeni Arabic accent, and the country’s famous hospitality.

"It’s sort of a magical place in some ways," said Rezneac, the Moldovan student. "It’s like landing in the 16th century. I feel like I’m not only in a different country, but on a whole different planet."

Longtimers like Scoble, a New Zealander who is a leading authority on Yemen’s water issues, takes the current troubles in stride. The country was divided for decades and became a Cold War battleground when the south gained independence from Britain. After reunification two decades ago, civil war erupted, and today the nation remains in turmoil.

"Going back to the [1990] time of unity, Yemen has never been a settled country," Scoble said. "There’s resistance against the regime and terrorism in pockets, but that’s always been there. Al Qaeda are the new kids on the block. But even they’ve been here for more than a decade."

He fears the spotlight on Al Qaeda could exacerbate Yemen’s problems by attracting more foreign militants -- as well as foreign governments that want to intervene.

"The media reports are a little bit inflammatory," said Scoble, "and I worry that some of it will be a self-fulfilling prophecy."