AFP

SANAA A SUICIDE bomber blew up a vehicle outside a presidential palace in southeastern Yemen on Saturday, killing 26 elite troops and overshadowing the swearing in of the first new president in Sanaa since 1978.

A military official said the bombing in the Hadramawt provincial capital Mukalla bore the hallmark of Al Qaeda, as Abdrabuh Mansur Hadi pledged after taking the oath to succeed veteran strongman Ali Abdullah Saleh that he would press the battle against the jihadists.

Militants loyal to Al Qaeda have exploited the decline in central government control that accompanied 10 months of deadly unrest that led up to Saleh’s agreement to cede power to seize large swathes of southern and eastern Yemen. “A pick-up truck driven by a suicide bomber exploded at the entrance of the presidential palace in Mukalla,” the military official said.

He said the attack “carries the fingerprints of Al Qaeda,” adding that the bomber “could be Mohammed al Sayari,” a Saudi originally from Hadramawt.

“The bodies of 20 soldiers were taken to the mortuary and there are many others wounded,” said a medic at Mukalla’s Ibn Sina hospital.

Another medic said later that “six others have died of their wounds.” The military source said no high-ranking officials were in the palace when the bomber struck. The palace is guarded by troops of the elite Republican Guard, who are under the command of Saleh’s son Ahmed and who played a key role in the veteran strongman’s deadly crackdown on the uprising against his rule before finally signing November’s transfer of power deal. In an address to the nation straight after being sworn in to succeed Saleh, Hadi vowed to press the fight against Al Qaeda and restore security across his impoverished nation, ancestral homeland of slain jihadist leader Osama bin Laden.

“It is a patriotic and religious duty to continue the battle against Al Qaeda,” the new president said.

“If we don’t restore security, the only outcome will be chaos.” Hadi said he had the political legitimacy to meet the huge challenges facing the country after winning overwhelming endorsement in a Tuesday election in which his name was the only one on the ballot paper.

He vowed to “turn a new page in the building of a new Yemen which unites all its citizens.” Official results released late on Friday gave Hadi 99.8 percent of valid votes cast in the election in which turnout reached 60 percent nationwide.