The news came as Yemeni President Ali Abdallah Saleh attended an inaugural ceremony of the patrol vessels at the naval base at Hudaydah.

Yemen will celebrate on May 22 the 15th anniversary of the reunification of the country and Saleh said the country would soon be "inaugurating modern and sophisticated (Russian) MiG-29" military aircraft.

He announced in December 2002 while on a visit to Russia that Yemen would buy six MiG-29 SMT warplanes with ground attack capabilities.

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