Tag: Yemen

SANAA - Yemen's opposition rejected an offer on Thursday to join Saudi-mediated talks on a transfer of power and set a two-week deadline for President Ali Abdullah Saleh to step aside.
"We have renewed our emphasis on the need for speeding the process of (Saleh) standing down to within two weeks. Therefore we will not go to Riyadh," said Mohammed al-Mutawakkil, a prominent opposition leader.

SANAA = At least seven people were killed including four policemen who clashed with a dissident army unit, as hundreds of thousands of anti-regime protesters rallied across Yemen on Wednesday. "Police attacked an army checkpoint in Amran province," 170 kilometres (105 miles) north of Sanaa, "killing one officer and wounding two soldiers," a military official told AFP. The four policemen died as the security forces traded fire with automatic weapons and rocket-propelled grenades in the

SANAA - Yemen opposition parties on Tuesday urged Gulf mediators to spell out whether President Ali Saleh would hand over power early under their proposal to end a two-month crisis over leadership and political reforms.
Gulf Arab foreign ministers said this week they would invite Saleh and the opposition coalition to mediation talks in Riyadh, a key financier of Sanaa who analysts say Saleh trusts, on a transition of power.
The opposition said on Monday they rejected the

SANAA - At least one anti-regime protester was killed and dozens shot in the cities of Taez and Sanaa, as Yemen's worried Gulf neighbours prepared to meet in Riyadh on Sunday to work out a transition plan.
Three other people were killed, including an intelligence officer and a soldier, in Abyan province, an Al-Qaeda stronghold in southern Yemen. The protester died of a gunshot wound after security forces using live fire hit dozens of demonstrators in overnight clashes in Sanaa

SANAA - Protesters kept up the heat on President Ali Abdullah Saleh on Saturday as deaths mounted in the flashpoint city of Taez, even as a dissident general denied aiming to replace the Yemeni leader.
On the regional scene, Yemen recalled its ambassador to Qatar, state news agency Saba announced, after a call from the Gulf state for Saleh to step down stirred anger in Sanaa. And the army shelled a suspected Al-Qaeda refuge in southern Yemen, after the United States expressed

SANAA - Western pressure mounted on Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh on Tuesday to stand down as least 24 people were killed in as many hours and Gulf states sought to mediate a deal with the opposition. A spokesman for Yemen's main opposition coalition, in an initial reaction to an offer by the Gulf Cooperation Council, said Saleh's foes were ready for a conditional mediation.
"We have welcomed (a GCC invitation) and said we will attend, but to discuss a transfer of power

SANAA - Yemeni security forces shot dead at least 17 protesters on Monday as Gulf states offered their mediation and Washington reportedly pulled the plug on embattled President Ali Abdullah Saleh.
"The death toll has gone up to 17," said Sadeq al-Shujaa, head of a makeshift field hospital at a square in central Taez after security forces opened fire on demonstrators marching on the governorate headquarters. Witnesses said the demonstrators stormed the courtyard of the

SANAA - At least five people were killed after police fired on protesters in the Yemeni city of Taiz, south of the capital, on Monday, a medical source said.
In the port city of Hudaida, armed men in civilian clothes opened fire on protesters, witnesses said. There was no immediate word on casualties there.

SANAA - Two Yemenis died and dozens were wounded on Sunday when police used live rounds, tear gas and batons to try to break up protests against President Ali Abdullah Saleh, who called for an end to weeks of unrest.
The two dead were among around 10 people hit by bullets in the violence in Taiz, south of the capital, where many were suffering from the effects of tear gas, a doctor said. He put the number of wounded at over 100. "Armoured vehicles and tanks are surrounding us.

SANAA - Yemeni police killed one protester and wounded scores of others when they opened fire on anti-government demonstrators in the city of Taez on Sunday, witnesses said.
"The man was shot in the chest while tearing up a poster of President Ali Abdullah Saleh," one witness said.
Others said that at least 250 protesters were injured, some with live bullets, when police fired tear gas and gunfire to disperse a protest heading to the governorate headquarters in Taez, some

SANAA - Yemeni protesters demanding the ouster of President Ali Abdullah Saleh said on Tuesday they would insist he leave power soon, blaming him for violence that has raised US fears of chaos that could benefit militants.
Explosions at an arms factory on Monday killed more than 100 people in a southern town where Islamists seemed to have driven out government forces, a reminder of instability that Saleh's Western allies fear in the poorest Arab state.
Al Arabiya TV said

ADEN - A massive blast killed at least 110 people on Monday at an ammunition plant in southern Yemen looted by Al Qaeda, as tracts of the south slip out of Sanaa's control in the thick of an anti-regime revolt. A security official said the explosion came as dozens of residents were inside the factory helping themselves to whatever ammunition was left after Sunday's raid by suspected Al Qaeda fighters. A local official, Nasser al-Mansari, told AFP between 75 and 80 were killed but that

ADEN - The death toll in an ammunition factory blast in south Yemen rose to between 50 and 55, doctors at a government hospital in the town of Jaar said. Witnesses said the blast took place after Jaar residents broke into the factory to steal ammunition a day after clashes broke out in the town between militants and the army.
Earlier reports indicated that 58 others were wounded by the blast.

ADEN - Central government forces in Yemen fought Islamist militants on Sunday after the militants seized control of parts of a south Yemen town, residents said. The militants forced the army to retreat from a hill overlooking the town of Jaar, taking over a state broadcast building and a rest house used by President Ali Abdullah Saleh on visits to the region.
The militants seized two tanks and one soldier was killed, the sources said. The army shelled key government buildings

SANAA - Yemen's President Ali Abdullah Saleh told thousands of supporters in Sanaa on Friday that he was prepared to hand over power to save bloodshed but only to what he described as "safe hands".
"We don't want power, but we need to hand power over to safe hands, not to sick, resentful or corrupt hands ... We are ready to leave power but only for safe hands," Saleh said in the speech, which came as tens of thousands of his opponents protested in another part of the capital.