Yemen’s opposition yesterday urged Gulf leaders to ensure a swift leadership transition to prevent a power vacuum in the deeply tribal country amid uncertainty over President Ali Abdullah Saleh’s health.
“Our Gulf brothers should quickly adopt firm positions to immediately and peacefully transfer power to the vice president,” Abdrabuh Mansur Hadi, parliamentary opposition spokesman Mohammed Qahtan said.
Mr Saleh was flown to Riyadh on June 4 for treatment a day after he was wounded when an explosion ripped through a mosque where he was praying inside his Sanaa presidential compound.
He is reported to be in poor condition and suffering breathing problems in a Saudi hospital, an informed source said on Saturday. “Time is not in favour of Yemen’s stability,” Mr Qahtan warned yesterday.
He urged the Gulf monarchies to push forward “an immediate transfer of power... to enable us to support the vice president and implement the rest of the Gulf initiative to resolve Yemen’s crisis and restore peace and stability.”
Gulf Arab foreign ministers, who suspended their mediation efforts on Yemen on May 23, are set to meet tomorrow.
Mr Saleh has steadfastly refused to sign a Gulf-brokered initiative that would see him transfer power to his deputy Hadi within 30 days in return for immunity from prosecution.
Speedy Gulf intervention is needed so “Yemenis don’t find themselves forced to rally behind the revolution youths” calling for the formation of an interim ruling council.
Mr Hadi has so far not responded to mounting pressure to set up the proposed council, as ruling party officials insist that Mr Saleh is still President.
At least 200 protesters have been killed in Yemen in more than four months of protests demanding the ouster of Mr Saleh, who has been in office since 1978.
Admiral Michael Mullen, the highest-ranking officer in the US armed forces, said on Wednesday that the conflict in the Arabian Peninsula country was making the Al-Qaeda terror network more “dangerous.”
Clashes yesterday in the flashpoint southern city of Zinjibar killed a Yemeni colonel, two soldiers and four suspected Al-Qaeda militants, a military official and medics said.