More clashes in Yemen amid calls for Saleh to quit

SANAA: Yemen’s opposition remained adamant on Monday that President Ali Abdullah Saleh step down immediately, after a fruitless meeting with Gulf mediators and late-night demonstrations in Sanaa turned violent and spread to other cities.

Hundreds of thousands of men and women protested in the capital late Sunday against Saleh’s call for an end to mixed-gender demonstrations against the regime, and called for his ouster. Security forces attacked them with firearms and tear gas grenades.

Thirty people were wounded by live rounds and 1,000 suffered from tear-gas inhalation, an AFP video reporter quoted a medical source at a Sanaa hospital as saying. Security forces also used water cannon to disperse demonstrators as police cars carried away many wounded protesters, witnesses told AFP.

Early on Monday, residents took to the streets in the Red Sea city of Al Hudaydah to protest against the use of force against Sanaa demonstrators. Medical sources said 45 people were wounded, 12 of them by bullets, when security forces intervened. Similar demonstrations to show solidarity with the Sanaa protests were also held late Sunday in Taez and Dhamar, south of the capital, and the main southern city of Aden.

After a meeting in Riyadh on Sunday with GCC states’ ministers, leading Common Forum opposition activist Mohammed al Sabri said: “The opposition has succeeded in conveying its point of view to Gulf monarchies” on the need for Saleh to step down. They “must understand that every day Saleh’s regime remains in power will be on the account of their stability”, he added. afp

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