Awlaki calls for killing of Americans "without hesitations"

U.S.-Yemeni radical cleric Anwar al-Awlaki has called for the killing of Americans "without hesitation," in a video message posted on jihadist websites, U.S. monitoring group SITE said on Monday.

"Do not consult anyone in killing Americans," Awlaki said in the 23-minute video, according to SITE.

"Killing the devil does not need any fatwa (religious edict)," he added.

"It's either us or you," Awlaki said, addressing Americans in the video which first surfaced on October 23 when one minute of footage was posted on jihadist forums.

Speaking in Arabic, Awlaki appears sitting behind a desk with a sheathed dagger in his belt.

The cleric, who was charged last Tuesday in Yemen over alleged ties with al-Qaeda and incitement to kill foreigners, is wanted in the United States on terrorism charges.

Washington has linked the young imam and son of a former Yemeni government minister to a shooting rampage last November at a U.S. army base and to the botched Christmas Day alleged al-Qaeda attack on a U.S. airliner.

Prosecutors on Tuesday told a Yemeni court specializing in terrorism cases that Awlaki had for months corresponded with Hisham Mohammed Assem, a Yemeni accused of shooting dead French energy contractor Jacques Spagnolo near Sanaa last month, encouraging him to kill foreigners.

Yemen, the ancestral homeland of al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden and headquarters of al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), has been under intense pressure from Washington to hunt down Awlaki.

"Mr. Awlaki is a problem," U.S. Homeland Security and Counterterrorism Adviser John Brennan said in January.

"He's clearly a part of al-Qaeda in (the) Arabian Peninsula. He's not just a cleric. He is in fact trying to instigate terrorism," said Brennan.

He directly accused Awlaqi of having links with Major Nidal Hasan who is suspected of shooting dead 13 people at Fort Hood military base in Texas and said he also have had contact with Nigerian student Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, accused of trying to blow up the Christmas Day