(Previous Incident Codes: YEM141 USYEM162 )

On November 19th, 2013, between three and five Al Qaeda members, including two Australians, were reported killed when an alleged US or Yemeni airstrike hit a vehicle traveling in the Ghayl Bawazir area of Hadhramout.

The Toyota Hilux belonging to the AQAP militants was reportedly bombed while in Mahfad in southern Yemen, following an intelligence tip that the men had been at an Al Qaeda gathering in the town. Witnesses said the vehicle, travelling in a convoy of cars, was “engulfed in flames”, charring the bodies inside. Residents reported hearing a powerful explosion after the attack took place. According to Nashwan News, local residents “saw the car on fire, and the plane roamed the sky for a while after the attack.”

Though most local sources, including a Yemeni security source speaking to United Press International, reported three militant deaths immediately after the attack, Yemen Press and Xinhua both reported four had died. After the identification of two Australian nationals amongst the casualties, later international reports suggested five AQAP casualties.

Multiple news sources, local reports, and tribal witnesses cited by the Associated Press alleged US responsibility for the strike. This the first known example of Australian militants dying as a result of US drone strikes. While a Yemeni army officer had said the attack was an “air strike” by Yemen Air Force warplanes, an anonymous official told the Associated Press the government had not carried out any strikes in the area. An investigation by the Bureau had also found the Yemen Air Force was “barely functional” and struggled to carry out precision strikes, such as an attack on a moving vehicle.

Though Mukalla Star reported the incident occurred at nine o’clock in the morning, a security source cited by Yemen press placed the incident at eleven in the afternoon.

The two Australians, Christopher Havard, 27, and Daryl Jones, 30, were identified by the Australian Federal Police from DNA samples sent to Australia by the Yemeni authorities.

Both had had their passports cancelled in 2012, when Canberra decided “they posed a threat to national security.” The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade insisted “there was no Australian involvement in, or prior awareness of, the operation.”

An unnamed counter-terrorism source told The Australian the two men were “foot soldiers” for AQAP and not the intended targets of the attack, which killed three other militants including Abu Habib al-Yemeni, who appeared to have been the primary target.

Both men had lived in New Zealand for a time and Jones held dual Australian and New Zealand citizenship.

The New Zealand Prime Minister, John Key, had reportedly signed a warrant allowing the New Zealand intelligence service (GCSB) to spy on Jones. He was told by GCSB late in 2013 that it was highly likely Jones had been killed. The US did not inform New Zealand of the strike.

Key revealed he was aware Jones had been in Yemen for “quite some time”. He said: “I knew that he had gone there and gone to a terrorist training camp.”

In July 2014 The Australian revealed the Australian Federal Police also had a warrant for Havard’s arrest, sought and granted three weeks before he was killed.

The strike killed three other men, known by their noms de guerre: Abu Habib al Yemeni, Wadhah al Hadhrami and Hamam al Masri, from Yemen, Hadhramout in Yemen, and Egypt respectively.

Christopher Havard was originally from Theodore, a small town in Queensland, eastern Australia. His nom de guerre was reportedly Abu Salma al Russi, having been mistaken for a Russian. He also used the pseudonyms Saleem Khattab, Abu Salamah and Hans Rosser Mauer.

He was implicated in the hostage taking of three westerners. A Finnish couple and an Austrian were snatched from an electronics store in Sanaa in December 2012. When they were released, in May 2013, it transpired the Finns had kept a strand of hair from one of their captors. It matched with Havard’s DNA. His family believed he had gone to Yemen to teach English.

Havard’s grandmother said he had spoken to him weeks before he died. She said he wanted to go home to Australia, adding: “He’d just had enough. I really don’t believe he wanted to be mixed up in what was going on.”

He had lived in New Zealand for two years, moving about the country. In 2010 he was reportedly living in Dunedin, in the South Island. In September that year he “scarpered” to Christchurch after a local court ordered him to pay NZ$4,000 (£2,000) in unpaid rent and damages.

Muslims in New Zealand described him as “a loner” and “a lanky, heavily-tattooed Australian who used to tie up his Dobermans outside the mosque while praying,” according to the New Zealand Herald.

The father of a former classmate said: “He didn’t learn too much at school, and he didn’t learn much after school either.”

Daryl Jones was originally from Christchurch, on the South Island of New Zealand. He went by the name Muslim Bin John and fought as Abu Suhaib al Australi.

Jones was born in Australia on September 14 1983 and moved with his family to New Zealand, his mother’s homeland. In 2008 he moved to Sydney where he converted to Islam. His younger brother, Nathan, remained in Christchurch and also converted to Islam.

Jones attended the Lakemba Mosque in Sydney – reportedly a “hotbed of radicalism”. It was there that he came to the attention of the counter-terrorism agencies, the Sunday Star Times reported. He was last heard of by his family around May 2012. When news of his death came though, his mother reportedly “fell apart”.

A friend told the Sunday Star Times: “As a parent, who wouldn’t be devastated that someone can flick a switch and your child is gone? It’s absolutely devastating. This is a completely broken woman. To lose a child this way. Who makes these decisions to murder your child, and doesn’t even let you know what happened?”

Jones was described by friends as “quiet, shy, gentle, polite and very serious”. One added: “There was a lot of anger there, and underlying insecurity issues”. Havard was called “a troubled teen”.