SANAA : Tens of thousands of supporters of Shia Zaidi rebels pressing the government to resign gathered Friday in the north of Yemen’s capital as a presidential team held crisis talks in their stronghold.
After the rally, a group of Zaidis started building an encampment on a road in northern Sanaa where the interior, communication and electricity ministries are located, an AFP reporter said.
The road, where the Shia rebels also have an office, leads to Sanaa International Airport. Against the backdrop of what were termed “positive” talks in the Zaidis’ northern Yemeni stronghold of Saada, the rally was staged on the final day of an ultimatum set by rebel commander Abdulmalik al-Huthi.
“The people want to overthrow the government,” chanted the protesters who joined the weekly Friday prayers.
“The people want the decision revoked,” they shouted, referring to the government’s doubling of fuel prices that came into effect this month.
The protest marks the start of the “second phase of the peaceful revolutionary escalation“ through “legitimate means”, Huthi said Thursday.
Thousands of armed Shia rebels, also known as Ansarullah or Huthis, have strengthened their positions around Sanaa as they press their campaign to force the government, which they accuse of corruption, to step down.
The movement has raised fears of a new wave of violence in impoverished Yemen, which is in political transition at a time of an Al-Qaeda insurgency and a southern separatist campaign.
“The situation in Sanaa is indeed combustible and ripe for miscalculation,” said April Longley Alley, a Yemen specialist with the International Crisis Group.
“At this point the Huthis are capitalising on widespread frustration with the government and the recent rise in fuel prices to rally support and extract political concessions,” he said.
Bracing for an escalation, President Abdrabuh Mansur Hadi on Thursday urged the armed forces to “raise their level of vigilance”.
But apart from the usual guards for the ministries, there was no sign Friday of a police or military presence near the makeshift protest sites, around which armed Huthi militants set up checkpoints.
The rebel commander has vowed: “We will not remain with our arms folded ... if the armed forces attacked protesters.”
Meanwhile, a presidential delegation was holding talks with the Huthi commander in his Saada stronghold to convince his group to join a national unity government.
Huthi said late Thursday that the delegation had “shown understanding for some of our demands” but negotiations and protests would continue.
Speaking to the defence ministry’s news website 26sep.net, presidential team spokesman Abdulmalek al-Mikhlafi said the results of talks with Huthi had been “positive and reassuring.”
Talks were continuing on Friday to “reach an agreement in the interests of the Yemeni people,” he said.
For Alley, “the best-case scenario at this point is for the president to broker a political compromise that includes significant changes to the widely unpopular unity government in return for the Huthis joining and supporting the government.”
The Zaidi rebels also strongly oppose the government’s plans for a six-region federation, demanding a single region for the northern highlands and a greater share of power in the federal government.
They control Saada province in the far north and parts of several neighbouring provinces.
Rebels reached the outskirts of Sanaa in July after seizing Amran to its north, although they later agreed to withdraw.
Ansarullah has been fighting an on-off conflict with government troops in the northern mountains for the past decade.
The Zaidi Shias, a minority in mainly Sunni Yemen, form the majority in the northern highlands, including the Sanaa region.