Twelve killed in Yemen protest
Twelve protesters were killed when Yemeni security forces opened fire on a massive anti-government demonstration in the capital Sanaa.
Another 190 were injured as about 100,000 opponents of the government filled a square at the centre of the uprising yesterday, spilling into the streets around the state TV building.
Security forces, including members of the elite Republican Guard, fired live ammunition and tear gas into the crowd to break it up. Snipers were seen on nearby rooftops aiming at the crowd.
Doctor Mohammed al-Ibahi said: “Many of the dead and wounded were shot in the head and torso.”
Yemenis in at least 18 cities and towns launched a civil disobedience campaign yesterday in an escalation of their more than two-month-old uprising to bring down long-serving president Ali Abdullah Saleh.
Shops, schools and government offices were shuttered.
The closures are planned twice-weekly until Saleh steps down, activists said.
Inspired by revolts across the Arab world, Yemenis have staged near-daily protests calling for the ousting of Saleh, the country’s ruler of 32 years.
At times, millions have flooded the streets of the capital and other cities and towns. The president has clung to power despite the street protests and defections by many loyalists, including his tribesmen, military officers and senior officials.
Security forces and Saleh supporters have killed more than 130 people since the unrest erupted in early February.
Chaos ensued after government forces opened fire in Sanaa yesterday, sending protesters scattering in all directions to escape sniper fire and security agents hurling rocks.
Activists said many of the security forces shooting into the crowd were dressed in civilian clothing.
Demonstrator Nashwan al-Badani said: “We were massing peacefully along the state television building and suddenly I heard so much gunfire whizzing by, People began to panic and fall to the ground as they stampeded to escape the shooting.”
Ambulances took the wounded to hospital, where the screams of women who had lost their children in the panic could be heard.
Ahmed al-Maqtari, a doctor helping to treat the wounded, said the injuries included wounds from live ammunition, rocks, and tasers.
In other violence yesterday, units of the elite Republican Guard force in the southern port city of Aden clashed with anti-government demonstrators who were marking the anniversary of the 1994 outbreak of Yemen’s civil war that saw Saleh’s army suppress an attempt by the southerners to secede.
One protester was killed and dozens were wounded in the clashes that involved tanks, armoured cars and heavy weapons.
And in the country’s second largest city, Taiz, tens of thousands demonstrated in main streets against a Gulf Arab initiative which has proposed giving Saleh and his family immunity from prosecution if the president steps down within 30 days.
Elsewhere, two soldiers were killed and three wounded when masked gunmen attacked a military checkpoint at the entrance of Zinjibar, the capital of southern Abyan province that has been a hotbed for Islamic militants.
The authors of the Gulf Arab initiative, the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council, will meet on Sunday in the Saudi capital Riyadh, where the group’s foreign ministers are to fine-tune the draft proposal for ending Yemen’s crisis.
Yemen’s opposition parties said on Tuesday they will soon sign the deal, which Saleh has already agreed to.
It calls for the creation of national unity government and would have Saleh transfer power to his vice-president within 30 days of the signing of the deal. In exchange, Saleh and his family would received immunity from prosecution.
But the proposal appears to have opened a serious rift between opposition parties and the hundreds of thousands of protesters on the streets, who are suspicious and instead demand Saleh resign immediately.
