US pulls out staff from Sudan, Tunisia

The US on Sunday ordered non-essential staff from its missions in Sudan and Tunisia to leave, as al-Qaeda called for fresh attacks on American embassies in the Arab world and West to avenge a movie deemed offensive to Islam.

Al-Qaeda in Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), in a statement on Saturday, praised the mob attack on the US consulate in Benghazi that killed four Americans, including US envoy to Libya Chris Stevens, on Tuesday night.

Its statement came as US President Barack Obama vowed to bring to justice those responsible for the killing of the Americans.

The AQAP, according to Washington-based IntelCenter, said in its statement that the incident that killed Stevens “is a major one” and called for efforts aimed at “expelling the embassies of the United States from Muslim countries”, more demonstrations and protests, and setting “fire to these embassies as our zealous people did in Egypt and Yemen.”

It went on to call on Muslims in the West to carry out fresh attacks due to their easy access to targets. “...they are the most capable of overcoming and easily accessing the enemy.”

According to IntelCenter, the statement concludes by recalling the words of slain al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden, which he had used to mark an upcoming attack, by saying, “The answer is what you see, not what you hear.”

The State Department, meanwhile, issued fresh travel warnings for Tunisia and Sudan in view of anti-US protests in the two countries.

In addition, all non-emergency personnel and relatives at US missions in Khartoum, Sudan, and Tunis, Tunisia, have been ordered to leave.