SANAA (AFP) -- Yemen has asked Washington to provide proof of its accusations against a Yemeni cleric whose arrest the United States has demanded over "terror" links, the official Saba news agency said Thursday.

"Yemen has told the United States of the need to provide clear evidence for the accusations against Sheikh Abdelmajid Zendani in order to take judicial measures according to Yemeni law," said the agency, citing an unnamed official.

U.S. President George W. Bush had sent a letter to his Yemeni counterpart, Ali Abdullah Saleh, protesting the inclusion of Zendani in the official delegation that attended and Islamic summit in the holy Muslim city of Mecca in Saudi Arabia in December, according to Saba.

It said that Bush had reminded Saleh that Zendani, who is a senior member of the Islah opposition Islamist party, was included on a UN list accused of financing terror and as such his inclusion in an official delegation was against UN resolutions.

"The United States has officially demanded from the Yemeni government to arrest Sheikh Zendani ... freeze his assets and prevent him from traveling abroad," added Saba.

Zendani is the dean of the Iman University, a private Islamic institution, and represents the hardline Salafist current within his Islah party.

Washington has been angered by the escape of 23 Al-Qaeda suspects from a jail in Sanaa prompting some lawmakers of charging that Yemeni authorities may have even facilitated the jail break.

Yemen offered a reward of more than 25,000 dollars for information that could lead to the capture of any of the suspected militants, including Jamal Badawi who was serving a 10-year sentence for the 2000 bombing of the destroyer USS Cole off the southern port of Aden, in which 17 U.S. sailors were killed.

Warships from the U.S.-led coalition patrolling the strategic waterways off Yemen have joined the hunt for the 23 escapees, while Interpol has announced a worldwide alert for the fugitives.

Yemen is the ancestral homeland of Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden whose network claimed the Cole attack.

Since the September 11, 2001 attacks in the United States, Sanaa has worked with Washington to clamp down on suspected Al-Qaeda sympathisers in the impoverished Arabian Peninsula republic.