Angered Yemeni protesters enter the Old City of Sana'a

For the first time in the many months of Yemen's unresolved revolution, residents from Sana'a's Old City march to key government locations in Sana'a. 4th November 2011
Sana'a's ongoing political and humanitarian crisis saw a new twist on Friday as residents of Sana'a al-Qadima (Old Sana'a) took to the streets to both government and anti-government opposition forces. Yemen's youth movement was spared their antipathy, which was reserved for President Ali Abdullah Saleh, defected Major General Ali Mohsen, and the General People's Congress and Islah political parties.
A heavy military presence transformed the appearance of portions of Sana'a al-Qadima - itself a UNESCO World Heritage Site - as government security forces, including the highly-trained Republican Guard were present to dissuade the marchers from progressing. However, the marching residents persisted and picked up additional marchers as they progressed down al-Silah Street to the Central Bank, down Tahrir Street and to the Ministry of Defense Building.
Pro-government supporters at Tahrir Square hurled insults at the protesters as they passed, with many flourishing jambiyahs (traditional Yemeni daggers) and a handful rushing after the Old City residents as they marched further down Tahrir Street. The Old City residents stopped before the Ministry of Defense building and loudly voiced their displeasure with the current political and social climate in Sana'a.
During recent fighting between government security and tribal opposition forces, errant shells landed in the Old City, enraging the local populace. Generally assumed to be among Saleh's most ardent supporters, frustration has grown among Old City residents after many months of inadequate water supplies and scarce electricity. Witnesses present at different stages of the march said that three individuals photographing its procession were detained by government security personnel.
The marching Old City residents, referring to the current regime, Ali Mohsen and his defected First Armored Divison, and members of both the General People's Congress and Islah political parties, chanted "The people want to deport all of them" and "The people want to live...all of them are corrupt" as they progressed down Tahrir Street.

Al-Qaeda militants attack Yemeni officials - report

November 4 2011

Al-Qaeda militants were believed to be behind an attack that targeted a member of Yemen's consultative council and an army colonel in the southern Yemeni province of Abyan, Arab media reported on Thursday.

The two men were wounded when their vehicle came under fire while they were heading towards the capital Sanaa, Doha-based Al Jazeera television said.

Militants, suspected of belonging to al-Qaeda, opened fire with a barrage of bullets at the car of Mohammed al-Haithami Ashal, wounding him in the leg, the broadcaster said.

Colonel Ahmed Naser Ashal, who was in the same car, received a bullet in the head, it added without adding further details.

The Abyan province is known to be a hotbed for Muslim extremists who belong to al-Qaeda.

Yemen has been gripped since January by violence between forces loyal to Yemeni president Ali Abdullah Saleh and anti-regime protesters who are calling for his ouster.

The international community has expressed fears that the ongoing unrest in Yemen has paved the way for al-Qaeda to take advantage of the situation. - Sapa-dpa

Yemen to reach power-transfer deal soon: FM

4th November 2011

Yemeni Foreign Minister Abu Bakr al- Qerbi affirmed on Wednesday that a political solution of power transfer would be reached soon between the government and the opposition, state-run Saba news agency reported.

"The ongoing efforts between the government and the opposition are concentrated on reaching an agreed mechanism to implement the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) initiative to peacefully transfer power (from President Ali Abdullah Saleh)," al-Qerbi was quoted as saying by Saba.

Al-Qerbi made the remarks during a meeting here with the U.S. ambassador to Yemen Gerald Feierstein and the EU envoy Michele Cervone d'Urso.

Saleh, who has been in office for 33 years, has confronted ten- month-long protests demanding his stepping down.

The GCC initiative, which was brokered in April, stipulated Saleh to quit in 30 days and hand over power to his deputy Abd Rabbu Mansour Hadi, who would then form an opposition-led national government and arrange presidential elections in 60 days. Saleh has backed out of signing the deal three times in the last minute.

On Tuesday, d'Urso told Saba that the ruling party and the opposition are about to reach a deal to bring the country into a new stage based on the GCC initiative and the UN resolution for transferring power from Saleh to Hadi.

"The situation in Yemen is moving through a new phase after the issuance of the UN Security Council Resolution 2014," d'Urso told Saba.

"We hope that Eidal-Adha (Muslim holiday) will be an occasion to announce that Yemen has moved towards a new stage," d'Urso said.

On Sunday, the ruling party said it would announce Vice President Hadi as its candidate for the presidential election proposed to be held after Saleh signs the GCC initiative.

The resolution 2014, which is unanimously passed by the 15- nation security council on Oct. 21,

Source: GNA

British govt. trains, equips Yemeni forces

November 4, 2011

The British government has spent tens of thousands of pounds training Yemeni security forces and supplying equipment to the suppressive regime over the last five years.

Junior defense minister Peter Luff revealed: Britain, the close supporter of the repressive regimes all around the world, provided the regime of US-backed Ali Abdullah Saleh with £90,000 worth of spare “non-lethal public order equipment.”

Luff also said that UK government gave “professional development training” to scores of Yemeni security forces.

The Ministry of Defense claimed that it suspended the training of officers loyal to Yemeni ruler six months ago in the wake of the “significant deterioration” in “political and security situation” of the country.

In a written parliamentary answer to Labour MP Mike Gapes, Luff backed the support the UK government gave to the suppressive regime, claiming it helped handling the threat of al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula.

He also said that British military experts went to Yemen last October and in February this year in order to train the forces at the Yemeni Central Security Force Public Order Battalion.

Yemeni protesters rally, bury their dead

November 04, 2011

SANAA: Protesters on Friday held massive demonstrations in Yemen's capital Sanaa and in Taez as they buried 19 people killed by government forces over the past two days in both cities.

A smaller number of President Ali Abdullah Saleh's loyalists staged a counter rally on the capital's Sabiin Avenue in support of the embattled leader, witnesses said.

Under the slogan "Remaining Peaceful is Our Choice," anti-regime protesters gathered in Sittin Road in Sanaa's northern district chanting: "Peaceful peaceful, no to civil war," witnesses said.

"The Yemenis' voice is one: we will bring corrupt Saleh to justice," they said as the veteran leader clings to power despite protests that have rocked the country since January, and international pressures urging him to step down.

The crowds took part in the funeral of three people killed in clashes between tribesmen and security forces in the northern Al-Hasaba district, the same sources said.

In central Sanaa, around 2,000 people who protested there against Saleh's regime clashed with government loyalists using rockes and batons, witnesses said. No casualties were reported.

A massive protest was also held in the second-largest city Taez as demonstrators took part in the funeral of 16 people killed in deadly clashes that have rocked the city over the past two days, organisers there said.

Saleh's opponents also announced the creation of a "legal committee," which organisers said will work on gathering evidence and witness reports from citizens on "the crimes of Saleh and the remnants of his regime" to present it to the International Criminal Court.

Peaceful protests have degenerated into battles between rival army troops, security forces and protesters, and between security forces and tribesmen, leaving hundreds of people dead across the impoverished country.

Meanwhile, a defiant Saleh has so far refused to sign a Gulf initiative, supported by the international community, that would see him step down in return for immunity from prosecution for himself and for members of his family.

Friend: Mass. suspect praised bin Laden, hijackers

By DENISE LAVOIE, AP Legal Affairs Writer – November 4, 2011

BOSTON (AP) — A Massachusetts man charged with conspiring to help al-Qaida referred to Osama bin Laden as "my real father" and spoke in glowing terms about the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, a friend testified Thursday in the man's trial.

Tarek Mehanna, 29, is accused of trying to help the terrorist organization by traveling to Yemen to seek terrorist training and translating videos and publications promoting violent jihad.

Ali Aboubakr, 25, was the first of several friends expected to testify against Mehanna. In online chats between the two men read in court Thursday, Mehanna and Aboubakr frequently sprinkle their conversations with the word "dude" and other American slang.

Testifying under an immunity order from prosecutors, Aboubakr said that he and Mehanna, both American-born citizens from wealthy Boston suburbs, discussed their admiration for bin Laden, the Sept. 11 hijackers and suicide bombers. He also described visiting ground zero with Mehanna and another friend in late 2005 or early 2006.

Prosecutors showed the jury a photograph of the men, wearing broad smiles and pointing their index fingers in the air. When asked by Assistant U.S. Attorney Jeffrey Auerhahn why they were smiling, Aboubakr said, "The attacks of 9/11 and what had gone on there."

In one chat, Mehanna describes his respect for bin Laden.

"Then, I realized I looked to him as being my real father, in a sense," Mehanna said, according to a transcript read by Auerhahn in court.

Aboubakr was a 20-year-old University of Massachusetts-Boston student when he said he and Mehanna would chat online and watch videos at Mehanna's home in Sudbury.

Aboubakr said they watched one video that showed the beheading of American businessman Nicholas Berg in Iraq. He said they also watched videos of suicide bombers and mujahedeen fighters around the world, including in Afghanistan and Chechnya.

"Dude, I saw the coolest blood donation clip today; I want you to see it," Mehanna said to Aboubakr in 2006, according to the transcript. Aboubakr said Mehanna was referring to a suicide bomber.

Another video showed U.S. Marines being wounded or killed as a bomb explodes while they try to dismantle it.

Aboubakr said he and Mehanna wanted to fight like the people they watched in the videos.

"There was an element of trying to gain inspiration," he said.

Several times during his testimony, Aboubakr said he did not really believe the things he told Mehanna, but he agreed with Mehanna to "get his approval."

Prosecutors say Mehanna traveled to Yemen in 2004 seeking terrorist training, and when that failed he returned home to the Boston area and began translating and distributing materials promoting terrorism on the Internet.

Mehanna's lawyers deny he was promoting terrorism, and say he was exercising his free speech rights to show anger over the U.S. invasion of Iraq. They say he visited Yemen to find religious schools.

Aboubakr said Mehanna told him he had gone to a school in Yemen. He said Mehanna told him during another conversation that everyone at the school "carries around AK-47s, and that it looked more like a camp than it did a school."

During another conversation, the two men discussed going overseas to fight and Mehanna told him it would not be easy to hide such a trip from his parents.

"I tried and they found out about it, so it's not that easy to keep them out of the picture," Mehanna said, according to the transcript.

"But seriously, if I try to go again, you would come?" Mehanna said.

Mehanna was initially charged in 2008, months after he graduated from the Massachusetts College of Pharmacy, with lying to the FBI about the whereabouts of Daniel Maldonado, a New Hampshire native who was later convicted of training at an al-Qaida terrorist camp in Somalia. Maldonado is now serving a 10-year prison sentence.

More serious charges were added in 2009, when Mehanna was accused of conspiring to provide material support to al-Qaida, conspiring to kill American soldiers in Iraq and other charges.

Mehanna's lawyers are expected to cross-examine Aboubakr on Friday.

Will Yemen's woes ever cease?

Medical check-ups delayed yet again the final solution for the 10-month long political crisis of Yemen, bemoans Nasser Arrabyee

November 3, 2011

Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh was supposed to authorise his deputy to sign a Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC)-brokered deal and implement all its steps until a new president is elected. However, Vice President Abdu Rabu Mansour Hadi last week flew to the United States for necessary medical checks.

And so did presidential political advisor Abdel-Karim Al-Eryani, who is the chief negotiator with the opposition forces about the GCC deal. And so UN envoy to Yemen Jamal Bin Omar consequently postponed his trip to Yemen.

Both Hadi and Al-Eryani are scheduled to return to Sanaa on the weekend. According to reliable sources in government and opposition, the UN envoy will attend the final consultations with both sides before the GCC accord is signed by Hadi.

Some of the opposition politicians confirmed Tuesday that they were informed by the US ambassador that Saleh had agreed to authorise his deputy to act for him until a new president is elected within three months after the GCC deal is signed.

The authorisation decree stipulates that Saleh will remain president until a new president is elected and that the authorised deputy should not remove him. This is a kind of guarantee.

Immediately, after the GCC deal is signed by Hadi, and the implementation mechanism is approved by both sides, the UN Security Council would issue a resolution binding all conflicting parties to implement the mechanism step by step and UN envoy Bin Omar would be monitoring all steps and performance of all parties.

After being authorised by President Saleh, Hadi would entrust someone nominated by the opposition to form a national unity government from the opposition coalition and the ruling party.

The opposition-chaired government would form a military and security committee chaired by Hadi, to control the army and security. The son and three nephews of President Saleh will remain in their positions as commanders in army and security until the end of the transitional period.

Then, the vice president would call for presidential elections within three month. Hadi himself would be the candidate of both the ruling party and the opposition as a man of national consensus.

Hadi would be elected as a transitional president for two years during which all political and constitutional issues are supposed to be solved.

However, the situation on the ground remains tense and escalation continues. The protesters refuse the GCC deal and insist on the ouster of Saleh without conditions, despite the fact that the opposition parties are involved in the GCC deal and negotiations with the ruling party.

The armed opposition tribesmen supported by rebel troops are still in almost daily confrontation with the government forces inside the capital and other places.

Meanwhile, the Nobel prize awarded to Yemeni activist Tawakul Karman this year along with two Liberian women has done little to calm the waters. The Yemeni Nobel Peace Prize winner Tawakul Karman described Saleh as a traitor, even as she was chastised by a fundamentalist cleric: "Karman was given the prize of Jews and Christians as a reward for her major treason of Islam, the state and the people," said Salafi cleric Mohamed Al-Emam.

"This woman corrupted the women and men, and she and those like her need to repent to Allah Almighty before they die," said Al-Emam in his lecture. Al-Emam heads one of the largest Salafi schools in Yemen.

In addition to his school, located in Mabar, some 70km south of the Yemeni capital Sanaa, there are about 4,000 other similar Salafi schools scattered all over the country. Gulf Salafi businessmen and other religious groups, especially from Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Kuwait, financially and logistically support these schools.

"This woman called for rebellion against Allah, and his Messenger and hijab, and this a criminal call," said the Salafi cleric who has tens of thousands of followers in Yemen. Al-Emam also blasted Karman's party, the Islamist party Islah, and called on its leaders to repent as well for dealing with the enemies, in a clear reference to Americans and Westerners in general.

So Yemeni's cliff-hanging revolution remains temporarily in suspension, with Karman and Al-Emam keeping protesters warm with their fiery words.

Source: Ahram Online

Yemen: Protests And Victims In Two Main Cities As Talks Continue

Written by: MISNA

November 3, 2011

Demonstrations and relative calm in Sana’a, protests and violent clashes in Taiz: the protests against President Ali Abdullah Saleh in Yemen’s two main cities continue.

MISNA sources contacted in Sana’a said that an anti-government demonstration is underway since this morning in the capital, but without the violence that erupted until mid October. However, three people were killed yesterday in clashes between the armed forces and combatants of the Sheikh Sadiq Al Ahmar.

In Taiz, protesters managed to seize control of some government buildings and banks, forcing security forces to intervene, according to the Defence ministry. The local media reports that the clashes left 5 dead and an unspecified number injured, though the toll is difficult to verify.

Meanwhile, negotiations proceed between the government and opposition representatives, who in the past days met with the US and other European Ambassadors. The focus of the talks was the accord proposed by the Gulf cooperation council that is mediating in the crisis, which foresees an end to the presidency of Saleh, in power for 33 years.

Yemeni Protester Clash With Republican Guard Leaves 7 Dead

November 02, 2011

By Mohammed Hatem

Nov. 2 (Bloomberg) -- Clashes in the Yemeni city of Taiz left seven people dead, as hundreds of thousands gathered in the capital, Sana’a, to urge the International Criminal Court to try President Ali Abdullah Saleh and members of his government.

The fighting between armed protesters and members of the Republian Guard in Taiz injured 21 people, activist Ahmed al- Wafi said today by phone from the southern city. Government forces shelled several areas with mortars and tanks, including a protest camp dubbed “Freedom Square,” he said.

The crowds in Sana’a demanded the release of activists who have been arrested or have gone missing since protests began in January. Hundreds of people have been detained in government crackdowns on protests this year, Abdulreman Barman, coordinator of the National Organization for Defending of Rights and Freedoms, said in an interview today.

Demonstrations began in Yemen, the Arab world’s poorest country, at the end of January, inspired by revolts that ousted the leaders of Tunisia and Egypt. They deepened as military and tribal leaders joined the opposition. Efforts by the Gulf Cooperation Council to broker a power-transfer agreement have failed.

Saleh returned to Yemen on Sept. 23 after three months in Saudi Arabia, where he received medical treatment following a rocket attack in the capital.

Breakthrough on Yemen power transfer near - EU envoy

Wed Nov 2, 2011
SANAA (Reuters) - Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh has moved a step closer to handing power to his deputy by accepting a U.N. formula to ease a transition and end an uprising against his rule, the EU envoy to Yemen was quoted by the state news agency Saba as saying.
Heavy fighting between Saleh's supporters and opponents spread through Yemen's third-largest city of Taiz, some 200 km (120 miles) south of the capital Sanaa, killing four people and wounding 40 on Wednesday, a doctor there said.
Saleh, 69 and in power for 33 years, has three times agreed to give up power, only to pull out at the last minute, defying hostile demonstrations inspired by protests across the Arab world.
Michele Cervone d'Urso, the European Union resident ambassador, was quoted by Saba as saying he believed the Yemeni leader had now accepted a U.N. transition plan.
"We are convinced that we are on the verge of reaching an agreement soon and above all else the matter calls for political commitment. We hope that Eid al-Adha (Muslim holiday) will be an occasion to announce to Yemen and the world that Yemen has passed towards a new stage," d'Urso told Saba.
D'Urso asked the opposition to return home before the holiday next week, so that a deal could be finalised. Opposition leaders are in Kuwait to drum up support for their movement.
A spokesman for a Yemeni opposition council treated the development with caution. "We heard good things from the diplomats, but actions speak louder than words. We are not optimistic right but if the Gulf initiative is signed we will be more optimistic," said Houriya Mashhur.
Ruling Yemen since 1978 through a civil war and rebel movements, Saleh has clung to power despite an assassination attempt that sent him abroad for three months for medical care, breakaway generals and nine months of street protests.
Neighbouring oil giant Saudi Arabia and the international community fear growing lawlessness in Yemen is giving al Qaeda's regional wing scope to plan and potentially launch attacks in the region and beyond.
In Taiz, fighting raged between government troops and dissident army units on the city's main street. A local source said a bank had been attacked and looting had broken out.
SMALL STEPS
There was no immediate Yemeni government reaction on d'Urso's remarks. But there have been indications of progress.
Deputy information minister Abdo al-Janadi said on Sunday the ruling party was close to announcing Vice President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi would succeed Saleh.
He said Hadi would return from the United States on Thursday to wind up dialogue with the opposition. He added: "He will sign the Gulf initiative and the mechanism for its operation in the near future."
U.N. envoy Jamal Benomar visited Yemen in September to try to devise a way of implementing a Gulf-brokered power handover and overcome political deadlock that has paralysed the Arabian Peninsula state and pushed it to the verge of civil war.
But he left empty-handed after two weeks of shuttle diplomacy between the opposition and the ruling party.
Benomar's plan requires Saleh to shift power to Hadi ahead of an early presidential election, which would be held within two to three months. In the meantime, the opposition would form a government with the ruling party and a body would be set up to restructure the armed forces.
But Yemeni protest leader Tawakul Karman, who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize along with two Liberian women last month said the deals on the table offered too little, too late.
"It is disgraceful that the few who claim to show an interest in the future of Yemen should be satisfied with proposing initiatives, the most outrageous of which is to give complete immunity to Saleh, his sons and senior aides from any accountability for the crimes they have committed, including the killing of hundreds of revolutionaries," she wrote in Britain's Guardian newspaper.

The world must not forsake Yemen's struggle for freedom

Yemenis are ready to pay the ultimate price to take on a brutal dictator. Yet the UN can't even bring itself to condemn him

Tawakkol Karman

guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 1 November 2011 20

We in Yemen are no less thirsty for freedom and dignity than our brothers and sisters in Tunis. After the fall of President Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali, our own vigils took a new direction when thousands of young people went on to the streets. They reached their climax with the fall of the Egyptian president, Hosni Mubarak, when millions of Yemenis called for the departure of the dictator, Ali Abdullah Saleh. Many in the Arab world were worried about our uprising. Everyone knew that the country is awash with weapons. It was feared that the revolution would descend into violence and distort the image of the other Arab uprisings.

But the Yemeni revolution surprised everyone with its astonishingly peaceful nature. This peacefulness exposed the unrestrained brutality of the regime toward the revolutionaries. They met the bullets of the regime with bare chests, preferring to guard their revolution rather than be lured into the quagmire of violence. A thousand martyrs fell and thousands more were injured, yet not one revolutionary raised a weapon in the face of the butchers.

What is truly regrettable, though, is that the world has not shown the least interest in what the Saleh regime does with Yemen and its revolutionaries. Despite this huge number of martyrs, despite the transformation of the country into a huge prison where citizens struggle to get even a drink of water for their children, and despite the use of heavy weapons against civilians, Saleh's regime did not even receive a token verbal condemnation from the United Nations or other world governments – despite our calls to impose sanctions. Yet harsh sanctions were imposed on other regimes that committed lesser crimes.

We in Yemen look forward to a clear stand from the UN, world governments and civil society organisations in condemning the violence of Saleh's regime. We would like to see definite measures to deter him from the violence he is perpetrating against his people and halt the actions of security forces that are led by his son and nephews. They have demonstrated in the clearest manner how instruments of the state can be commandeered in the interests of an individual.

Today we need a concerted international effort that would result in freezing the assets of the ruling family, which are estimated at $10bn. Saleh and his relatives plundered the public coffers during the last three decades of his abuse of power.

And there must be no let-up in the pursuit of members of Saleh's regime for the crimes they have committed against peaceful demonstrators, which can be classified as crimes against humanity. It is the duty of the European commission and member states of the European Union to uphold the principles of human rights and the rejection of corruption.

In the same vein, I call upon them to show similar concern for the suffering of the revolutionaries in Syria, where the machinery of President Bashar al-Assad's regime produces a daily harvest of dead and wounded. This is a moment of truth for the values of freedom about which our region has heard so much from the international community, without having access to them.

Now our peoples have awakened to break the chains and seize our destinies. The least we desire from the institutions of the free world, and especially the US and the countries of the European Union, is that they appreciate our struggle for freedom. We want them to discharge their responsibilities towards vulnerable people and support them in the face of the cruelty of rulers who continue to kill.

It is disgraceful that the few who claim to show an interest in the future of Yemen should be satisfied with proposing initiatives, the most outrageous of which is to give complete immunity to Saleh, his sons and senior aides from any accountability for the crimes they have committed, including the killing of hundreds of revolutionaries.

But perhaps the most basic error of the international community is to describe what is happening in Yemen as a political crisis and not a revolution. The Yemenis insist it is – not by words only, but with their blood, which the regime continues to shed.

In my capacity as a leader of the popular and youth revolution in Yemen, I reaffirm our adherence to the peaceful nature of our struggle until the end. At the same time, I ardently call upon the free people of the world to examine what is happening in my country and Syria especially, and to honour their responsibilities to confront rulers who do not hesitate to carry out the most heinous crimes against people who have the temerity to demand their natural rights to freedom and dignity.