By BI: Shocking images have been released which show the corpses of unidentified men hanging from a road bridge after they were publicly shot dead in the Al Qaeda-controlled city of Mukalla, just one day after group’s leader is killed in American drone strike. The two ‘spies’ were later seen hanged in front of a huge crowd, beneath a banner reading: ‘The House of Saud directs American planes to bomb the holy warriors.’

Times of India  A spokesterrorist for the group said the men had been accused of infiltrating the jihadist network to provide information connected to the death of Nasir Wahisi, a former senior lieutenant of Osama bin Laden.

Witnesses said al-Qaida gunmen in the southern city of Mukalla read out charges before shooting the two men, one of whom was accused of guiding the drone that killed commander Nasr al-Ansi and a media liaison known as Muhannad Ghalab in April.

Al-Qaeda supporters posted pictures online that showed the two men blindfolded on a sandy beach, said to be the site of a previous drone strike. Another picture showed a body in bloody clothes lashed to a pole, dangling off a bridge.

The killings came a day after al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, as the Yemeni affiliate is known, said its leader, Nasir al-Wahishi, was killed in a US drone strike last week.

Al-Qaeda captured Mukalla in April after Yemen’s army splintered between allies and opponents of Shiite rebels known as Houthis. But the city has proven to be something of a death trap, with US drone strikes in and around Mukalla killing not only al-Wahishi and al-Ansi, but also a senior religious ideologue, Ibrahim al-Rubaish.

In series of online postings, al-Qaida members said one of the two men shot dead Wednesday was a Saudi national loyal to the Islamic State group, which controls vast regions of Iraq and Syria. They identified him as Musaed al-Khaweitar and said he ran an al-Qaida-linked media outlet and was close to top leaders.

The second man, identified as Abu Ayman al-Mutairi, is also believed to be Saudi.