Yemeni authorities have claimed regaining control of the southern town of Loder, a great part of which was in the grip of suspected Al-Qaeda militants during days of clashes with the army.
"Security authorities have done their job efficiently and professionally," Deputy Interior Minister General Saleh al-Zaweri said late Tuesday in a statement carried by Saba state news agency.
He said that security forces have "stormed the dens of the terrorists" in Loder, in the province of Abyan, and were "chasing the runaway elements."
"Security forces have taught the terrorists of Al-Qaeda a hard lesson and inflicted painful hits on them, forcing those terrorist elements that tried to hide, to flee after dozens were killed and wounded," he added.
Zaweri said that more than 12 suspected Al-Qaeda militants were killed in the fighting which started on Friday.
An AFP tally based on official and medical sources had put the total death toll Tuesday at some 33 people, including 19 militants, 11 soldiers, and three civilians.
Authorities said Adel Saleh Hardaba, 27, whom they described as the Al-Qaeda second-in-command in Loder, was among the dead.
The army had at that start of the fighting distributed pamphlets urging civilians in Loder, which has a population of 80,000, to leave.
Security officials had told AFP at the weekend that civilians had mostly fled the city and that "only gunmen are left." Many of the militants were believed to be foreigners, notably Saudis and Pakistanis.
South Yemen, and Abyan province in particular, is feared to have become a base for Al-Qaeda militants to regroup under the network's local franchise, Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP).
Largely tribal Yemen is the ancestral homeland of Al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden.