Yemen LNG pipeline blown up, output halted after drone attack

A U.S. drone attack killed at least five suspected al Qaeda militants in southern Yemen on Friday, and gunmen retaliated by blowing up an LNG pipeline, forcing output to be stopped, officials and energy workers said.
   
The drone set fire to the militants' car in the southern province of Shabwa and killed all its occupants, one official said. One bystander was also killed and five were wounded, officials and residents told Reuters.
  
 Hours later gunmen believed to be militants blew up a  pipeline which transports gas to a facility whose leading stakeholder is French oil major Total at Balhaf port on the Arabian Sea, energy workers said.
   
Residents said flames could be seen from several kilometres (miles) away and a company employee said exports had stopped.
   
"The explosion took place 28 km (17.5 miles) north of the Balhaf LNG export plant. Production has been halted," an employee of Yemen LNG, who asked not to be named, told Reuters.
  
In a separate incident, suspected al Qaeda fighters shot dead two men in the southern port city of Aden on Friday, a local official said. The victims belonged to a clan that has  opposed the group's militants in nearby Abyan province, he said.
  
In a persistent dispute over fishing rights with Eritrea, Yemeni forces captured two Eritrean soldiers trying to seize a Yemeni fishing boat near the Red Sea port of Hudaida, Yemen's Interior Ministry said.

Reuters