MANAMA, Bahrain (AP) — A top security official in Yemen says al-Qaida militants planned to kill American photojournalist Luke Somers on Saturday.
At a security conference in Bahrain, Yemen’s national security chief, Maj. Gen. Ali al-Ahmadi, said: “Al-Qaida promised to conduct the execution (of Somers) today so there was an attempt to save them but unfortunately they shot the hostage before or during the attack. He was freed but unfortunately he was dead.”
A senior Obama administration official tells The Associated Press that militants tried to kill Luke Somers just before the raid, wounding him. U.S. commandos took Somers to a Navy ship in the region where he died.
A South African hostage, Pierre Korkie, also was killed. A South African aid group says arrangements had been made to free Korkie tomorrow.
U.S. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel says that Somers and Korkie were “murdered” during the rescue.
Hagel says that several terrorists were also killed in the mission carried out by U.S. special forces.
Luke Somers was abducted in September 2013 in Yemen’s capital, Sanaa. This week, the Pentagon confirmed it launched an earlier failed raid to rescue him.
Copyright 2014 The Associated Press.