"Crowds press for Yemen president’s ouster; Blamed for blast that killed 100 at munitions plant" March 31, 2011|By Ahmed Al-Haj, Associated Press
SANA, Yemen — Hundreds of thousands of antigovernment protesters packed the streets of cities throughout Yemen yesterday, demanding the president’s ouster and blaming him for a munitions factory blast that killed at least 100 people.
Enraged men chanted as they walked toward public squares in Sana and elsewhere, waving their national black-white-and-red flag. Many sported green bandannas wrapped around their heads emblazoned with the word “leave,’’ while others scrawled the word on their palms, waving their hands in the air....
Yesterday’s largely peaceful demonstrations ratcheted up the pressure, spreading beyond the traditional gatherings in the capital, the port city of Aden, and the town of Taiz to include Saada, where Shi’ite rebels have fought Saleh’s forces for years, Marib, an Al Qaeda stronghold, and the southern province of Abyan, where Islamic militants have seized power in areas.
The militants, loyal to Al Qaeda, seized power of two towns, a strategic hilltop, and a munitions factory in Abyan this week. The factory exploded Monday, killing dozens of impoverished residents who were stripping the place bare.
That prompted accusations by Yemen’s opposition groups that Saleh effectively helped the militants by pulling the army back from the factory area and letting the terror network take power to stoke Western fears that Al Qaeda is poised to take advantage of any vacuum left by his departure.
“Without this organized pullout and the planned chaos by the regime, the massacre at the factory would have not happened,’’ an umbrella group of opposition organizations said in a statement.
Youssef Said, a leader in Saleh’s ruling Congress Party and a professor at Aden University, denied the allegations. “These accusations are false and are part of the opposition’s political maneuvering.’’
The party called for the president’s supporters to stage a massive demonstration tomorrow to counter those calling for him to step down....
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"Cleric calls Arab unrest a boon for Al Qaeda" April 01, 2011|By Maamoun Youssef, Associated Press
CAIRO — A Yemeni cleric contends that violent Islamist groups will be able to take advantage of the Arab world’s wave of popular unrest, even if it leads to secular governments in Egypt, Tunisia, Libya, and other countries.
Anwar al-Awlaki, who was born in the United States and who has been accused of fomenting anti-American fervor among militants, writes in a new edition of Al Qaeda’s online magazine that any new governments will be weaker than the regimes they are replacing and that will create opportunities for Al Qaeda and its allies to operate with more freedom....
Related: WHOOPSIE! Anwar al-Awlaki, Yemen toner mastermind, actually died in 2009!
Yeah, I'm no longer digging up dead men.
Awlaki writes in the English-language article....
PFFFFFFFFTT!
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Had to have been an April Fool's joke.
"In Sana, the Yemeni capital, tens of thousands of pro- and antigovernment demonstrators took to the streets after noon prayers in peaceful rival demonstrations that were among the largest since popular unrest erupted there two months ago."
"In Yemen yesterday, tens of thousands of antigovernment protesters hurled stones at riot police backed by tanks in the southern province of Aden, as dueling rallies were held in the capital."
"In shift, US now seeks negotiated exit of Yemen’s president; Saleh unlikely to bring reform" byApril 04, 2011|By Laura Kasinof, New York Times
SANA, Yemen — The United States, which long supported Yemen’s president, even in the face of recent widespread protests, has now quietly shifted positions and has concluded that he is unlikely to bring about the required reforms and must be eased out of office, according to United States and Yemeni officials.
The Obama administration had maintained its support of President Ali Abdullah Saleh in private and refrained from directly criticizing him in public, even as his supporters fired on peaceful demonstrators, because he was considered a critical ally in fighting the Yemeni branch of Al Qaeda.
This position has fueled criticism of the United States in some quarters for hypocrisy for rushing to oust a repressive autocrat in Libya but not in strategic allies like Yemen and Bahrain.
That position began to shift in the past week, administration officials said. While US officials have not publicly pressed Saleh to go, they have told allies and some reporters that they now view his hold on office as untenable, and they believe he should leave....
It is not clear whether the United States is negotiating a safe passage for Saleh and his family, and residency in another country, but that appears to be the direction of the talks in Sana, the capital.
Yesterday, thousands of women calling for the ouster of Saleh were attacked by police with sticks and rocks, setting off a furious battle with male protesters that left several people hurt, activists said.
I thought Muslim men hated their women?
The women were marching down a main street in the southern town of Taiz shouting “peaceful, peaceful,’’ when they were attacked, activist Ghazi al-Samei said.
Three of the young men suffered serious gunshot wounds when police opened fire, protester Bushra al-Maqtari said by telephone. She said over 200 more suffered breathing problems caused by inhaling tear gas.
Army tanks and armored cars stopped other demonstrators from entering Taiz, the site of some of the largest and angriest protests against Saleh’s rule.
Maybe the protesters deserve to be angry after the way they have been treated.
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"Yemeni troops kill 15 protesters; Saleh defies US, European pressure" April 05, 2011|By Ahmed Al-Haj, Associated Press
SANA, Yemen — Military forces and police snipers opened fire yesterday on marchers calling for the ouster of Yemen’s embattled president, killing at least 15 people and sending a strong message of defiance to US and European envoys seeking to broker a peace deal after weeks of bloodshed.
The melee in the southern city of Taiz — part of an intensifying crackdown on the opposition — underscored the resolve of President Ali Abdullah Saleh to cling to power even as protest crowds resist withering attacks and crucial allies switch sides and call for his 32-year rule to end.
It also showed the challenges facing behind-the-scenes diplomatic efforts to quell the nearly two-month-old uprising in a nation that Washington considers a front-line battleground against Al Qaeda’s most active franchise....
I didn't know CIA shops were independently owned and operated?
Saleh has been a key ally of the United States, which has given him millions in counterterrorism aid to fight Al Qaeda’s branch in the country, which has plotted attacks on American soil. So far, Washington has not publicly demanded that he step down. But the diplomatic efforts are a sign that the Americans believe replacing Saleh would pose a smaller risk than the current instability does....
They are cutting him loose, 'eh?
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"Tribe of Yemen leader clashes with army unit" April 06, 2011|By Ahmed Al-haj, Associated Press
SANA, Yemen — Tribesmen loyal to Yemen’s embattled president clashed yesterday with a group of soldiers whose commander has sided with the opposition, and the fighting in a suburb of the capital Sana left three tribesmen dead, tribal elders and military officials said....
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon told Saleh yesterday that he sent a small team to determine how the United Nations could best help quell tensions.
How about staying out of it?
The UN chief’s office said office said he “expressed strong concerns for the dead and the injured, and urged utmost restraint from both government and opposition’s forces.’’
What, no bombing to protect civilians?
So when are you going to express such concern for Palestinians under Israeli assault?
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"Protesters return to streets in Yemen; Tens of thousands defy government’s deadly crackdown" April 07, 2011|By Ahmed Al-Haj, Associated Press
SANA, Yemen — Defying a government crackdown, tens of thousands of protesters yesterday poured into the streets of Yemen’s second-largest city in the latest demonstrations against the president.
Two groups of protesters met up in the city center, where a general strike had closed shops and banks in what activists were calling the “Tsunami of Taiz’’ and the largest demonstration in this troubled southern city to date.
You taking notes, Americans?
More than 120 people have been killed since Yemen’s protests calling for the removal of President Ali Abdullah Saleh began Feb. 11, inspired by popular uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt.
In Taiz alone, 16 people were killed Monday when government forces opened fire on demonstrators.
The rising death toll across the country has helped inflame public opinion against the government and sent even more people flooding into the streets of the Arab world’s most impoverished country....
Isn't it amazing how KILLING YOUR OWN PEOPLE ALWAYS BACKFIRES?
Several cities in the country now host permanent “protest camps’’ in main squares, mimicking the two-week-long Tahrir Square sit-in that brought down Egypt’s president in February. Last Friday, hundreds of thousands demonstrated against Saleh across the country.
Can't this guy see it is TIME TO GO?!!!!
The president has offered to step down at the end of this year if a transfer of power acceptable to him is reached.
The arrogance of these guys knows no bounds.
But the opposition fears that Saleh, a consummate survivor, is just stalling for time, in hopes that he can find a way to stay in power or hand over control to one of his sons....
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"Yemen’s president rejected a mediation offer by Gulf nations that called on him to resign, denouncing the proposal in a speech before tens of thousands of cheering supporters in the capital yesterday. Demonstrations around the country demanded his ouster and turned bloody in a southern city where three people were shot and killed.
The violence in Taiz took place during a burial procession. Witnesses said police fired tear gas and bullets and beat protesters carrying the coffins of several people killed during a demonstration last week.
That is sacrilege.
Three men were fatally shot, at least 10 others were seriously injured, and hundreds of others suffered breathing problems, said Dr. Sadek al-Shuga, who was running a makeshift field hospital nearby.
Security forces surrounded the Taiz protesters and the clashes continued after dark yesterday, said Taiz activist Bushra al-Maqtari. By evening, tens of thousands of demonstrators poured into the Yemeni capital, Sana, chanting slogans against President Ali Abdullah Saleh....
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"A regional bloc of oil-rich Arab nations along the Persian Gulf, including powerful Saudi Arabia, called on Yemen’s president to give up power as part of a deal with the protest movement demanding his ouster after 32 years, a Gulf diplomat said.
Can't this guy read the WRITING on the WALL?
Keeping up the pressure, tens of thousands of protesters marched in Yemen’s capital, Sana, a day after renewed clashes between demonstrators and security forces there. Witnesses said police fired a barrage of tear gas late Saturday and that many demonstrators suffered breathing problems.
The statement, by foreign ministers of the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council, was a call for President Ali Abdullah Saleh to step down, something he has refused to do. The bloc repeated an offer to mediate between Saleh and his opponents, said the diplomat, who requested anonymity because of the matter’s sensitivity.
The bloc’s plan would have Saleh resign in exchange for immunity from prosecution.
Clear that with the protesters did you?
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"Tens of thousands of Yemenis demonstrated across the country yesterday against a mediation proposal by neighboring Persian Gulf nations because it offers the president immunity from prosecution.
Protesters in the capital, Sana, carried flowers for security forces and swore they were ready to die as they repeated their two-month-old call for Yemen’s president to leave office after 32 years....
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"In Yemen yesterday, gunmen loyal to the government attacked the forces of the president’s chief rival in the northern capital of Sana, killing one person and raising fears that Yemen’s weeks of popular unrest could evolve into pitched battles between factions of the divided military.
State media described the attack as a case of the government’s rapid response forces quelling a “provocative action’’ by Major General Ali Mohsen al-Ahmar, the commander of the First Armored Division.
Yemen’s military split on March 17, when Ahmar, President Ali Abdullah Saleh’s chief competitor for power, declared his solidarity with the protesters who have been demonstrating for weeks calling for the president’s ouster.
Until the incident early yesterday, there had been no clashes.
Yemen has been wracked by protests over the country’s lack of freedoms and its extreme poverty. More than 120 people have been killed since the uprising began on Feb. 11.
In the southern capital of Aden, security forces clashed yesterday with thousands of protesters who hurled rocks and burned tires, killing at least one person.
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Then the string finally broke:
"More than 100,000 demonstrators returned to the streets of the Yemeni capital yesterday, some chanting for President Ali Abdullah Saleh and, about 2 miles away, many chanting against.
In what has become a weekly ritual, Saleh delivered a speech in front of tens of thousands of supporters following midday prayers.
Many carried banners with pro-Saleh slogans or slurs against the political opposition and Al Jazeera, the satellite news channel. Others climbed to the top of flagpoles and waved Saleh posters.
There were clashes reported in the central city of Taiz between plainclothes government supporters and protesters. More than a dozen protesters were injured by thrown rocks and daggers, according to a local doctor.
By contrast, the opposing demonstrations in the capital took on a more relaxed — at times, even jovial — feel, a month after government-linked snipers opened fire on antigovernment protesters here, killing 52 people.
The military was notably less present on the streets yesterday than it was in previous weeks.
Even Saleh appeared less defiant, focusing on how, as he put it, the masses “come to these squares to say yes to the constitutional legitimacy, yes to freedom and democracy, yes to Ali Abdullah Saleh, president of this nation.’’
The man is DELUSIONAL or INSANE!!
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"Yemen’s antigovernment movement took up the issue of women’s rights in the conservative Muslim nation yesterday, as thousands of demonstrators seeking the president’s ouster denounced his comments against the participation of women in protest rallies.
In a speech Friday, President Ali Abdullah Saleh said the mingling of men and women at protests in the capital was against Islamic law."
Oh, he HAS TO GO NOW!
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