World Bulletin / News Desk

Al-Qaeda-linked Ansar al-Sharia group in Yemen said Friday that one of its leaders was killed in a U.S. drone attack.

Nasr al-Onsi, his eldest son and a number of group members were killed by a U.S. drone, group leader Khaled Batrafi said in a video footage.

Batrafi, however, did not mention where al-Onsi was killed.

Al-Onsi recently appeared in a video in which he declared his group's responsibility for an attack on French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo in January.

Last month, a suspected U.S. drone attacked a number of al-Qaeda members in Yemen's southern city of al-Mukalla.

Al-Qaeda did not, however, mention the names of its leaders killed in the attack.

American drones have been staging attacks against positions of al-Qaeda in southern Yemen for several years now.

Yemen has been in turmoil since 2011 when a popular uprising forced autocratic President Ali Abdullah Saleh to step down a year later.

Since March 25, Saudi Arabia and several other Arab allies started pounding positions of the Houthi group.

Saudi Arabia and its Gulf neighbors suspect that the Houthi insurgency is supported by Iran.