By DPA
Sana’a (Yemen) : An Indian engineer was shot dead and five people were injured when a “psychologically disturbed” security guard opened fire at an oil field in southeastern Yemen Saturday, police said.
Police officials told DPA that the injured were two Britons, an American, a Tunisian and a Yemeni.
The shooting occurred at the Jannah oil field in the oil-rich province of Shabwa, around 470 km southeast of capital Sana’a.
The man, armed with a rifle, opened fire randomly at the men as they stepped out of a helicopter owned by the US oil firm, Occidental Petroleum Company, after it landed at a small airport inside the oil field.
The attacker was arrested on the premises after other guards shot him in his legs. Police officials said the motives for the crime were believed to be personal.
The interior ministry said primary investigations showed that the assailant, identified as Jameel Mohammad al-Raye, was “psychologically disturbed”.
The official Saba news agency said the injured men were all in critical condition and that they were airlifted to Sana’a for treatment.
Names of the victims were not released, and company officials refused to comment.
It was the second such incident inside an oil field in the Arabian country where gun violence is frequent in the largely lawless tribal areas.
In March 2003, a Yemeni man shot four oil company co-workers, killing an American, a Canadian and a Yemeni, before shooting himself dead in an oil field in Marib, some 190 km east of Sana’a.