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| Arabia |
| Yemeni rebel leader denies seeking Shiite state |
| 2009-09-30 |
| [Al Arabiya Latest] A Yemeni Shiite rebel leader on Tuesday denied government claims that the sect's insurgents want to set up a Shiite state in north Yemen, describing the conflict as a fight for rights. Several Arab countries are concerned over the influence of Shiite Muslim Iran, which they believe is trying to extend its influence by supporting the sect's minorities in the region. The rebel leader, Abdul-Malik al-Houthi, said some soldiers were cooperating with the rebels despite an "Operation Scorched Earth" launched by the government in early August to try to crush the insurgency by the rebels -- locally known as the Houthis after their leaders' clan. The government has portrayed the conflict as an effort by extremists of the Shiite Zaydi sect to re-establish a cleric-ruled state, or "Imamate" in religious parlance that fell in 1962 leading to the creation of the Yemeni republic. President Ali Abdullah Saleh, himself a Zaydi, has avoided sectarian language, but government rhetoric elsewhere regularly attacks the rebel movement over their Zaydi beliefs. "The authority's accusations about the Imamate are just a media war and misleading public opinion. We are not asking for positions, we are asking for rights and justice. The essence of the crisis is political," Houthi said on the rebels' website. He denied that Iran was backing the rebels or providing arms, which he said some in the army had smuggled to them. "We have been able to obtain a huge amount of equipment and weapons from (seized) army positions and it is not strange that there are some noble people of conscience in the army who have cooperated with us," Houthi said. Zaydis, who adhere to a different sect from Shiite Islam followed in Iran, are thought to form around a third of Yemen's population of around 23 million. Saleh said on Saturday the army was ready to fight Shiite rebels for years if necessary, calling on them to accept a ceasefire his government has proposed. The international aid group Oxfam said last week Yemen could soon face a humanitarian crisis as a result of the escalation of fighting. Since disturbances first broke out in 2004 around 150,000 Yemenis have been displaced, aid groups say. |
| Posted by:Fred |
| #1 yeah yeah, sure. 12vers are going to relinquish control of sada. |
| Posted by: newc 2009-09-30 05:53 |