SANAA, 25 May 2003 — Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh will today visit Abu Dhabi where, following a political amnesty, he may meet exiled socialist opposition leaders. Saleh could see several “secessionist” figures who are among 16 exiled leaders pardoned on Wednesday, the eve of the 13th anniversary of the merger of the former north and south Yemen, opposition sources said.
Some of the 16 live in the United Arab Emirates and Saleh could inform them of the amnesty personally, a Yemen Socialist Party (YSP) source told the Internet newspaper Al-Sahwa.net. Other Yemeni opposition leaders who live in Saudi Arabia and Oman could travel to Abu Dhabi for the talks, the paper said. Official sources told Al-Sawha.net that Saleh might bring some of the men back to Sanaa aboard his flight, as he did last year with former Socialist Party No.2 Salem Saleh Mohammed, who also stayed in Abu Dhabi.
Saleh has been invited to the UAE by President Sheikh Zayed ibs Sultan Al-Nahayan for talks to boost bilateral relations and to review developments in Iraq and Palestine, official said.
In May 1994, the secessionists declared a Democratic Republic of Yemen, one month after a north-south civil war broke out. The south lost the war and they fled into exile.. The secessionists were headed by Ali Salem Al-Baid, who also led the YSP. He took refuge in Oman and said he had retired from political activities. Five of the leaders, including Baid, were sentenced to death in absentia. The others were former prime minister Haidar Abu Bakr Al-Attas, former defense minister Haitham Qassem Tahar, Aden governor Saleh Munassar Al-Siyali and former deputy prime minister Saleh Obeid Ahmed. Yemen’s opposition has hailed the amnesty.
Women’s Protest: About 5,000 Yemeni women protested in Sanaa yesterday demanding that Germany release a popular Yemeni Muslim cleric detained for suspected links to the Al-Qaeda terror organization. Sheikh Muhammad Ali Hassan Al-Moayyad, 54, a prominent member of the Islamic-oriented opposition party, Islah, and his bodyguard, Muhammad Muhssien Zaid, 32, were nabbed by German police at a hotel in Frankfurt on January 10. The arrest was made on a US warrant allegedly for financing Al-Qaeda.
