This morning a coordinated car bombing and attack by heavily armed militants on the US embassy in the Yemeni capital of San’a left 16 dead. It is the second attack on the embassy this year, though the first one to actually hit its target. The other strike, a mortar barrage in March, missed the embassy and hit a nearby school wounding 18.

The attack began with a car bomb, but US officials reported as many as five separate explosions. After that the militants attacked with automatic weapons, rocket-propelled grenades, and sniper fire from across the street. The attack killed six Yemeni guards and four civilians, six of the attackers were also killed. There were no US casualties in the attack.

Though so far no one has taken credit for the attack, State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said it “bears all the hallmarks of an al-Qaeda attack”. The attack comes just one month after the State Department had lifted its ordered departure of all non-essential embassy personnel, which it issued shortly after the previous incident.

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