Yemen will try 11 suspects this month over al-Qaeda linked attacks on two ships in the Gulf Arab country which is trying to shed its image as a haven for militants.
"Six suspects are accused over the US destroyer Cole blast...and five are accused over the French supertanker Limburg bombing," the September 26 state-run weekly quoted a Yemeni official as saying today.
Thirty other suspects will also be taken to court in April over a string of terrorist attacks and bombings in Yemen, he said.
A total of 17 US service men were killed in a suicide attack on the U.S. destroyer Cole in the port of Aden in 2000. Two years later, militants believed to be from Osama bin Laden's group also struck the French supertanker Limburg.
The poor Arab county arrested a number of people following both attacks and had neighbouring Saudi Arabia - also battling a surge of militant violence - extradite eight Yemenis suspected of terrorism.
Yemen, the ancestral home of al Qaeda's Osama bin Laden, has been cooperating with the U.S.-led "war on terror" since the September 2001 attacks on New York and Washington - blamed on al Qaeda.