Sanaa, Yemen (CNN) -- Yemeni security forces have driven out al Qaeda elements who infiltrated the town of Hawta in southern Shabwa province, the state-run news agency reported.
Brig. Gen. Ahmed al-Maqdashi, the security director of Shabwa, told the Saba News Agency on Friday that Yemeni troops were now chasing down al Qaeda fighters who fled to the mountains surrounding Hawta.
This week's military offensive was touted by Yemen as part of an intensified hunt for terrorists, especially those linked to the offshoot al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula.
But a senior government official told CNN that Yemen may have exaggerated the scale of the fighting in order to secure more aid from other nations, particularly the United States.
The official said it was no coincidence that this high-profile military campaign coincided with a visit to Yemen by President Barack Obama's counterterrorism advisor John Brennan and a meeting in New York of the Friends of Yemen, an international group addressing Yemen's poor political and economic conditions that have provided fertile ground for militants to set up base.
CNN
