Civil disobedience campaign against President Ali Abdullah Saleh held in 18 Yemeni towns and cities
Yemeni residents have launched a civil disobedience campaign in an attempt to bring down the country's long-serving president, President Ali Abdullah Saleh.
The campaign is the latest step in Yemen's uprising that started in early February, inspired by revolts across the Arab world.
According to opposition activists, residents in at least 18 cities and towns got involved in Wednesday's campaign, with shops, schools and government offices closed. Activists plan to hold the day-long closures twice weekly until Saleh goes.
Saleh has clung on to power despite the street protests and defections by many loyalists, including his tribesmen, military officers and government figures. More than 130 people have been killed by security forces and Saleh's supporters since the unrest erupted.
In the southern port city of Aden on Wednesday, units of the Republican Guard clashed with anti-government demonstrators who were marking the anniversary of the 1994 outbreak of Yemen's civil war that saw Saleh's army suppress an attempt by the southerners to secede.
One protester was killed and dozens were wounded in the violence that involved tanks, armoured cars and heavy weapons, according to local activist Wajdi al-Shaabi.
Elsewhere, two soldiers were killed and three others wounded when masked gunmen attacked a military checkpoint at the entrance of Zinjibar, the capital of southern Abyan province that has been a hotbed for Islamist militants.
Colonel Ahmed al-Muhsini, of the Zinjibar intelligence office, confirmed the attack over the telephone and told the Associated Press the assailants fled afterward.
Along with prevailing poverty, rampant corruption, lawlessness, southern secessionism and a Shia uprising in the north, Yemen has also had to deal with brazen militant attacks and a resurgent al-Qaida branch that has been active inside the country and beyond its borders.
In the country's second largest city, Taiz, tens of thousands of protesters demonstrated against a Gulf Arab initiative which gives Saleh and his family immunity against prosecution, activist Nouh al-Wafi said.
The authors of the initiative, the six-nation Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC), will meet on Sunday in the Saudi capital Riyadh where its foreign ministers are to fine-tune the draft proposal for ending Yemen's crisis.
Yemen's opposition parties said on Tuesday they would sign the deal, which Saleh has already agreed to. It calls for the creation of national unity government, with Saleh transferring power to his vice president within 30 days of signing of the deal. In exchange, Saleh and his family would received immunity from prosecution.
But the proposal appears to have opened a serious rift between opposition parties and protesters on the streets, who are suspicious and are instead demanding that Saleh resign immediately.
Saudi reports have speculated that the deal could be signed as early as Monday in Riyadh.
The head of the Yemeni opposition's council for dialogue, Salem Mohammed Bassindwa, said his side would only accept a deal that Saleh signed personally and not one signed by a presidential envoy. He suggested it would be best for Saleh to sign the agreement in Sana'a, with witnesses from the GCC, America and the European Union.