[30/July/2009]

SANA'A, July 30 (Saba) – The al-Houthi rebel group has killed more than 330 Yemenis, including 28 women and 10 children, and injured about 200 other last year in the northern Yemeni province of Saada, security sources said Thursday.

The sources were quoted by the military-run 26september weekly as saying that the al-Houthi followers' crimes bloodily raised in Saada, some 230 kilometres north-west of the capital Sana'a.

"One of their worst bloody crimes was the murders of four women and a fifth injured last Tuesday in Gamar district of Saada", said the sources, describing the murders as brutal acts which discard by all religions and humanitarian and ethical values.

"The Houthi rebels, who are led by the rebel leader Abdul-Malik al-Houthi, also killed citizen Aziz al-Fareh after he was injured by them in his leg. They killed him by 20 shots in the head".

Local sources in Saada said that the latest crimes were among several crimes committed by the Houthi criminal elements.

"They have killed tens of innocent women and children", added the sources.

The sources affirmed that the rebellion elements are still ongoing violations on people living the province as well as targeting services and development projects, private and pubic properties and attacking army forces and checkpoints.

"In addition they are trying to control some mosques and schools and securing and supporting drug smugglers".

Last Tuesday, an army officer was killed and two of his bodyguards injured in an ambush by the Houthi rebels in Saada.

An al-Houthi armed group opened fire at a military car carrying Colonel Aidarous Thabit al-Sabri and his four bodyguards on a road between Saada and Sana'a.

Since the fighting erupted in 2004, thousands of people, soldiers and insurgents have been killed in Saada, which lies close to border with Saudi Arabia, after the rebel group was founded by Shiite rebel leader Hussein al-Houthi.

Hussein, the eldest brother of the current group leader Abdul-Malik, was killed by the army in September 2004.

The Yemeni government accuses the al-Houthi group of trying to reinstall the rule of imams, which was toppled by a republican revolution in northern Yemen in 1962.

Sunni Muslims are about 55 percent of Yemen's population of 23 million people and reside in the coastal plains and southwestern part of the country while Shiites are about 42 percent of the population and live in the highlands.

There are also a small numbers of Jews, Christians, and Hindus present.

North Yemen gained its independent from the Ottoman Empire in 1918 and in 1967, the British withdrew from what would become South Yemen.

In 1990, the two countries formally unified as the Republic of Yemen. In 1994, a southern secessionist movement led to a brief civil war.

YA

Saba