US-born cleric Anwar al-Awlaki was killed in a US airtstrike (photo courtesy creative commons)

The Obama administration stirred up controversy when CIA officials placed al-Awlaki on its “targeted kill list” last year.  It marked the first time an American was added to the list and raised the question of whether it was legal to target an American for death when he had not been convicted of a crime.

The Associated Press reports the following:

“The Yemeni government announced that al-Awlaki was "targeted and killed" around 9:55 a.m outside the town of Khashef in mountainous Jawf province, 87 miles (140 kilometers) east of the capital Sanaa. It gave no further details.

Local tribal and security officials said al-Awlaki was traveling in a two-car convoy with two other al-Qaida operatives from Jawf to neighboring Marib province when they were hit by an airstrike. They said the other two operatives were also believed dead.”

A second American-born al-Qaida operative, Samar Khan, is also believed to have been killed in the strike.  

Al-Awlaki was born in New Mexico and moved to Yemen in 2004.  He was linked to Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, the army psychologist accused of killing 13 people at Fort Hood in 2009, and Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the alleged “underwear bomber” who officials say tried to blow up a US airliner on Christmas day 2009.

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