SANAA, 18 June 2007 — Fighting between government forces and Shiite rebels in northern Yemen was brought to an end yesterday after a joint agreement was mediated by Qatar.
No skirmishes were reported yesterday from the northern province of Saada, which borders Saudi Arabia.
Saada, about 240 kilometers north of the capital Sanaa, was the scene of a three-year conflict between army forces and followers of the Shiite group ‘Believing Youth’.
Local officials in Saada told Arab News by phone that the deal to halt armed confrontations came into force by dawn yesterday.
Yemen’s Interior Ministry declared late on Saturday that military operations against Shiite rebels were halted as the rebels’ leader declared an end to violence.
The two parties agreed that ending the fighting would be followed by a general amnesty for followers of the ‘Believing Youth’ rebel group, the ministry said in a statement carried by the official Saba news agency.
Under the agreement, the rebel leader Abdul-Malik Al-Houthi and his two brothers, Yahay and Abdul-Kareem, would be allowed to live in exile in Qatar. Guerilla leader of rebels, Abdullah Eydha Al-Rezami, would also be allowed to go.
Yemeni government officials told Arab News the four rebel leaders will leave for Qatar soon.
But the men would be banned from all political activity and cannot leave Qatar without the permission of Yemeni government.
The ministry’s declaration came a few hours after the rebel leader, Abdul-Malik Al-Houthi announced he had accepted a Qatari proposal to end fighting that has left hundreds dead. “For the sake of preventing bloodshed, we declare a halt to violence and fighting and adhere with the country’s republican system, constitution and laws,” Al-Houthi said in a statement.
Bloody clashes have been raging between government forces and followers of the Shiite “Believing Youth” group since the fighting flared up last December in the latest wave of battles between the two parties.
Tens of thousands of army troops were deployed in Saada to crush a revolt that originally began after Shiite cleric Hussein Al-Houthi, the elder brother of Abdul-Malik, established the movement in March 2004. The army killed Hussein in September the same year.
Waves of bloody confrontations between the rebels and army troops already since mid-2004 have left hundreds of government troops and rebels dead.
Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh has repeatedly accused the Houthis of trying to topple the republican regime and re-establish the rule of Zaidi imamate, a royal regime that was overthrown by a revolution in 1962.
The Al-Houthi’s movement is an offshoot from the Zaidi sect of Islam, which is regarded as a moderate sect.
