17 U.S. sailors are confirmed dead

Friday, Oct. 13, 2000 | 11:13 a.m.

SUN WIRE REPORTS

ADEN, Yemen -- U.S. investigators converged today at this port where an apparent bomb attack on a refueling U.S. destroyer killed 17 sailors. Military planes evacuated the 33 injured to Germany and the east African country of Djibouti.

Meanwhile a U.S. military flight landed this evening in Ramstein Air Base, Germany, carrying the bodies of the dead sailors.

Navy officials in the United States, meanwhile, said explosives experts who examined the USS Cole's damaged hull have concluded that Thursday's blast came from an external source, bolstering the contention that it was a terrorist attack.

U.S. officials say suicide bombers blew up a small boat next to the 9,100-ton destroyer, ripping a hole 30 feet high and 40 feet wide at the ship's waterline.

Seven bodies have been recovered, and 10 sailors missing since the blast were presumed dead, according to U.S. Navy officials in Washington. Officials said they expected to find more bodies today.

The Navy released the names of the 17 sailors. All but one is from the enlisted ranks. Two are female.

Western diplomats in Yemen said the warship's explosion seemed to be the work of a well-organized group with good connections in the port of Aden who might have provided the bombers with some logistical support.

The diplomats, insisting on anonymity, said the boat used by suicide bombers was similar to boats used by port authorities to guide vessels into port or facilitate ships with refueling.

Meanwhile, American military planes evacuated 22 of the 33 injured from Aden to Germany for medical treatment, said Lt. Terrence The Cole, a Bahrain-based U.S. Navy spokesman in Yemen.

The French Defense Ministry said its army planes had taken the 11 other injured sailors overnight to Bouffard military hospital in Djibouti, where six underwent surgery.

Dudley said some of the injured sailors were in serious condition and others were stable. He did not give further details.

American investigators as well as U.S. Marines and soldiers filled Aden, bringing in equipment to search for clues beneath the water near the USS Cole. Sniffer dogs also were seen being brought to the area. The HMS Marlborough, a British frigate, was heading to Yemen from the Gulf to provide technical assistance, Dudley said.

He said investigators may keep working at the site another two days. The USS Cole, one of the world's most advanced warships, was left slightly tilted in Aden harbor.

"The ship took (in) some water and we are trying to dewater it. But, generally, it is seaworthy and we will tow it to the United States," said Dudley, of the Bahrain-based U.S. 5th Fleet.

The Cole is a $1 billion guided missile destroyer home-ported at Norfolk, Virginia. It was heading with a crew of about 350 to the Gulf for maritime intercept operations in support of the U.N. embargo against Iraq.

More than 200 miles away in Yemen's capital, San'a, an explosion rocked the British Embassy today. Windows shattered, but nobody was hurt. Britain's foreign secretary said a bomb may have been flung into embassy grounds.

U.S. embassies in the Middle East said today they had been ordered by the U.S. State Department to cease public operations until Monday in light of developments in Yemen and escalating violence in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

Dave Ballard, a U.S. Embassy spokesman in Cairo, Egypt, said the order affects the embassy's library and probably its visa operations. Because of the Friday-Saturday weekend in many Islamic countries, no practical effect would be seen in many countries until Sunday.

Anti-American sentiment has been running high in the Arab world where protesters have been condemning the United States during demonstrations against Israel's actions in two weeks of deadly clashes in Jerusalem and the Palestinian territories.

In Washington, President Clinton said Thursday that the USS Cole explosion appeared to be an act of terrorism, the worst against the U.S. military since the bombing of an Air Force barracks in Saudi Arabia in 1996 that killed 19 Americans.

Islamic extremists have been active in Yemen, but Yemeni Prime Minister Abdul-Karim al-Iryani said in March that the United States' most-wanted terror suspect, Osama bin Laden, at one time had "colleagues" in Yemen, but now "has no place in Yemen, no military camps."