Britain, U.S. agree to fund Yemen’s counter-terrorism unit

Posted by Mc Parry on January 3rd, 2010 No Comments Printer-Friendly

LONDON – The United States and Britain have agreed to fund a counter-terrorism police unit in Yemen as part of stepped-up efforts to fight terrorism, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown’s office said on Sunday.

The opposition Conservatives accused Brown of playing politics with the issue of terrorism after he conceded in a BBC interview that he had not held direct talks on Yemen with U.S. President Barack Obama and that the initiative had been in place for some time.

The failed Christmas Day attack in which a 23-year-old Nigerian is accused of trying to blow up a U.S. passenger jet as it approached Detroit has focused attention on both sides of the Atlantic on the growing threat from al Qaeda in Yemen.

Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, charged with the plane attack, has told U.S. investigators he was trained by al Qaeda in Yemen.

Brown’s Downing Street office said Britain and the United States had agreed to intensify their joint work to tackle “the emerging terrorist threat” from both Yemen and Somalia in the wake of the failed Detroit attack.

“Amongst the initiatives the prime minister has agreed with President Obama is U.S.-UK funding for a special counter-terrorism police unit in Yemen,” it said in a statement.

Britain and the United States will also support the Yemeni coastguard, it said, adding that the greater transatlantic cooperation had been discussed in a series of phone calls since the Detroit attack.

Pressed by the BBC’s Andrew Marr, Brown said he had not held direct talks with Obama on the subject and the initiative was “a continuation … but a strengthening of what we’re doing.”

“The truth is we’ve been doing this for some time,” he said.

The Conservatives, favorites to beat Brown’s Labour Party in an election due by June, said it was a “disgrace” for a prime minister to play politics with terrorism by re-announcing an existing initiative.

“We need a measured and sensible debate about how we respond to the threats we face — exaggeration and spin by Downing Street has no place in that debate,” Conservative security spokesman Chris Grayling said in a statement.

A spokeswoman for Brown said the initiatives were the result of ongoing work between Britain and the United States and had been under discussion since before the Detroit attack.

Funding will come from existing commitments to Yemen, she said. The Foreign Office website says British aid to Yemen will rise to 50 million pounds ($80 million) a year this year from 20 million pounds a year previously.

Brown has called an international meeting in London on January 28 to discuss how to combat radicalization in Yemen.

On Somalia, whose government is battling Islamist rebels, Brown’s office said he and Obama “believe that a larger peacekeeping force is required and will support this at the U.N. Security Council.”

A senior U.S. administration official said he was unaware of plans for a push for a larger U.N. peacekeeping force for Somalia.

The Somali government and the African Union (AU) have pleaded with the United Nations to send a robust peacekeeping force to take over from the 5,200 AU troops from Uganda and Burundi who have said they are incapable of stabilizing Somalia. (Reuters)