| Submit your comments on this article |
| Arabia |
| Calm prevails in northern Yemen after truce |
| 2010-02-14 |
| [Al Arabiya Latest] Calm prevailed in northern Yemen on Saturday, the second day of a shaky truce between government forces and Shiite rebels that broke into deadly violence hours after it went into effect, both sides said. "The situation is calm on all fronts in Saada province," the center of the sic-year old rebellion, said one military source. "But the calm is precarious," said another of the latest in a string of truces over the years that have broken down. A spokesman for rebel leader Abdul Malak al-Huthi confirmed that there was no fighting, saying the "ceasefire is being respected and the situation is developing positively." Meanwhile, the rebels said they had pulled out of an occupied airport in the north and were arranging to free their Saudi prisoners, in line the truce agreed with Sanaa. "Today, we carried out our withdrawal from the perimeter of the airport of (the city of) Saada, where a plane will land for the first time" since August, rebel spokesman Mohammed Abdel Salam told AFP. He said the insurgents also had began to dismantle roadblocks in the north and were on the verge of freeing Saudi prisoners captured in border clashes that began last November. Salam said "measures are underway to hand over the Saudi prisoners to a mediator, Ali Nasser Kersha," a tribal official from the northern province of Saada. A ceasefire in the government's latest six-month campaign to crush the rebellion went into effect at midnight (21:00 GMT) on Thursday. Only hours later Yemen's army accused the rebels of breaking the truce, saying they had killed four soldiers in a string of attacks. On Saturday, however, the rebel spokesman downplayed those incidents, saying "those were minimal violations that it is possible to overcome." For his part, Sultan Barakani, parliamentary chief of the ruling General People's Congress, said the "authorities are concerned with restoring peace in Saada and will not tolerate impediments to the process that began with the ceasefire." The six-point truce requires the rebels to reopen three major routes in the first stage of implementation: the road between Saada, Harf Sufian and the capital, Sanaa; the road from Saada west to Malahidh and the road from Saada east to al-Jawf. It also calls for a rebel withdrawal from government buildings, the return of weapons seized from security forces, the release of all prisoners including Saudis, handover of captured army posts, and a pledge not to attack Saudi Arabia. The Saudis joined the fighting in November after accusing the rebels of killing a border guard and occupying two small villages. Saudi ground troops and aircraft repeatedly engaged the rebels in operations the rebels said continued even after their fighters had withdrawn from all Saudi territory they occupied during the fighting. |
| Posted by:Fred |