Tense calm prevails in north Yemen after deadly clashes

YEMEN PRESIDENT: Ali Abdullah Saleh (Getty Images)

A tense calm took hold on Monday after deadly clashes at the weekend between government forces and Shiite rebels in the rugged mountainous north of Yemen, a military official said.

"After the last rockets were fired at 11 pm (2000 GMT), no military action has been taken" in the northern areas of Saada, Al-Malaheed and Harf Sufyan in Amran, the official said.

"We're keeping our fingers on the trigger," he added, when asked whether the calm would last.

The Yemeni army said it killed more than 140 rebels after the insurgents launched an assault on the government's mansion in the mountain city of Saada on Sunday.

The government announced a unilateral suspension of fighting on Friday, saying it would become a permanent ceasefire if the rebels, whom it accuses of being backed by Iran, abided by certain conditions.

A rebel spokesman said they would "examine" the conditions, but hostilities resumed on Saturday.

The main government demand is that the rebels "respect the ceasefire and the opening of roads, evacuate their positions and free captured civilians and soldiers."

The government launched "Scorched Earth Operation" on August 11, which led to a humanitarian crisis among the tens of thousands of civilians forced to flee their homes, according to relief groups.

The government accuses the rebels of seeking to restore the Zaidi Shiite imamate, a form of clerical rule that was overthrown in a republican coup in 1962 that sparked eight years of civil war.

An offshoot of Shiite Islam, the Zaidis are a minority in mainly Sunni Yemen but form the majority community in the north.

The United Nations estimates that some 150,000 people have fled homes in the north since the uprising first broke out in 2004.

The Zaidi rebels are also known as Huthis after their late leader, Hussein Badr Eddin al-Huthi, who was killed by the army in September 2004.

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