40 security officers killed by gunmen on motorbikes in 2012

Motorbikes are seen as an economical mode of transport in Yemen Yemen's Interior Ministry has issued a report claiming that 40 Yemeni officers were killed by gunmen on motorcycles in 2012. The majority of the crimes were committed in the capital Sanaa, with 18 cases , followed by 15 in the Lahj province, 10 cases in each of Hadramout and Taiz provinces and 6 in Dhale province. The other offences were committed in provinces of Aden, Baidha, Abyan and Dammar.
According to the report, 95% of the crimes carried hallmarks of al-Qaeda terrorists, indicating a shift in their methods of attacking members of the armed and security forces.
In the past, al-Qaeda in the Arab Peninsula has called on its members to use motorcycles and avoid using vehicles, after US drone attacks increased against them.
Despite taking restrictive measures on the use of motorcycles, the Yemeni government has failed to contain the series of assassinations carried out in the last 12 months, using motorbikes.
The are seen as a better choice for al-Qaeda because of their ease of use and difficulty in tracing, due to the majority not having registration plates.
According to the report, several senior officers has been murdered by unknown gunmen this year, including Salem Qatan, an Iraqi officer working as an adviser at the Ministry of Defence and commander of the Southern Military Region. He was killed in an attack along with 4 civilians, one of them a US citizen, in Taiz.
There was no accurate statistical information about the motorcycles used in Yemen, but sources in the traffic police estimated that up to 100,000 motorcycle are used in the capital Sanaa alone, most of which are not registered.
Thousands of Yemeni families used motorcycles as their only mode of transport, because running costs can be as low as $300 per month.