Heavy clashes erupted Sunday between Yemeni troops and Zaidi rebels in the rugged mountainous north, military officials and witnesses said, as humanitarian conditions worsened further in the impoverished country. Army tanks fired salvos as armored cars blocked the entrances to the narrow alleys of the old city in Saada, stronghold of the Zaidi rebels seeking to end the current form of government, the officials said.The rebels returned fire on the army from a hide-out in a fortress overlooking the old town. Shops were closed and residents stayed indoors. "They (the army and the rebels) clashed and the police halted all traffic. I was not able to get to work," Abdel-Qader, a clerk, told AFP by telephone.
The fighting intensified on Saturday, leaving dozens of people dead or injured in the north of Yemen, according to military officials.
After waging its "Scorched Earth" operation for three weeks, the government said Friday it would observe a ceasefire in response to requests from aid agencies. But fighting resumed only four hours after the truce was declared.
The Zaidi rebels, also known as Huthis, accused the government Sunday of preventing civilians displaced by the fighting from returning to their homes and of using them in the battle. "The government is not looking to apply a ceasefire but is trying to mislead and trick in order to use the issue of the displaced and those harmed (by the fighting) to get military assistance to the (army's) besieged positions in Saada and Amran," the rebels said in a statement. They said the government had bombarded Amran province with rockets and fired artillery on areas there.
Four rebel leaders died in clashes that lasted for nine hours on Saada on Saturday until the insurgents took flight from government forces, who destroyed rebel havens in the city, a military official was quoted by the official Saba news agency as saying.
A local official told Saba that rebels had murdered six women and ten children in a "horrendous manner". "The rebel and terrorist elements attacked (a) village and killed women and children by shooting them in the head and neck, accusing them of cooperating with the government," the official said.
Also Saturday, the army uncovered the bodies of 15 young men in Harf Sufyan in Amran province believed to have been killed by the rebels, a military official told AFP.
There is no official toll of casualties incurred since the government began its operation Aug. 11 against the rebels, who are loyal to leader Abdul-Malek Al-Huthi and who the government alleges are supported by Iran.
UNHCR said Friday that civilians, including some 35,000 internally displaced people (IDPs), in and around Saada remain trapped by the fighting and are unable to reach safer parts of the country.
"The situation is most critical in the city of Saada which has been cut off from the rest of the world for more than two weeks," Andrej Mahecic, a spokesman for the UNHCR, which has evacuated its staff from Saada.
"There has been no water or electricity in Sa'ada city since August 12. Food reserves are running low and the situation is becoming untenable for families, many of who are hosting friends, relatives or neighbors displaced by the street battles."