ADEN, (AFP) – A Yemeni intelligence officer has been killed and two policemen and a detained suspect wounded in separate attacks in the south, military and security sources said on Saturday.

Abdul Aziz Abdullah Bashraheel was shot dead on Friday by two masked gunmen on a motorcycle in Foha, west of Mukalla, capital of Hadramawt province, a security official said.

He was with members of his family outside a store when he was attacked by the gunmen, who fled afterwards.

In Abyan province further west, a police car was attacked with rocket-propelled grenades, also on Friday.

Two policemen were wounded, as well as a man whom they had arrested on criminal charges and who suffered serious injuries.

The suspect, Mohammed al-Jaadani, had been arrested in the city of Loder, which was the site of clashes between the army and suspected Al-Qaeda militants in August that killed 33 people.

Loder is also a focal point of activity by the Southern Movement, a coalition of groups demanding either independence or autonomy for the south.

South Yemen was independent from the British withdrawal in 1967 until it united with the north in 1990. It seceded in 1994, sparking a brief civil war in which the region was overrun by northern troops.