The remains of four Americans, including US ambassador to Libya Chris Stevens, killed in an assault on the US consulate in Benghazi arrived yesterday in the United States.

Their remains were carried from the belly of a C-17 transport aircraft by seven marines in dress uniform, in transfer cases draped in the US flag into an aircraft hanger at Andrews Air Force base outside Washington.

A band played sombre music as the cases were lifted into black hearses parked inside the hanger before family members of the dead, officials and other dignitaries.

While marking the return to US soil of the four Americans killed in Libya, President Barack Obama vowed to “stand fast” against anti-US violence in the Arab world.

“Their sacrifice will never be forgotten, we will bring to justice those who took them from us.

“We will stand fast against the violence on our diplomatic missions,” Obama said at Andrews Air Force base outside Washington.

Ambassador Stevens, information officer Sean Smith, and former Navy Seals Tyrone Woods and Glen Doherty were killed when a mob torched the US consulate in Benghazi on Tuesday.

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said the deaths of the four diplomats in Libya were “senseless” and “unacceptable.”

“The people of Egypt, Libya, Yemen, and Tunisia did not trade the tyranny of a dictator for the tyranny of a mob,” Clinton said.