SANAA, Yemen (AP) — Police on rooftops fired live bullets and tear gas at protesters Sunday, wounding at least 100 people camping out near Sanaa University. The day’s violence, which also left one dead in a southern province, was the latest evidence that monthlong protests demanding the resignation of Yemen’s longtime leader were spiraling out of control.
Embattled President Ali Abdullah Saleh has resorted to increasingly violent tactics to try to put down the burgeoning uprising against his 32-year rule, deploying dozens of armed supporters on the streets in an attempt to intimidate protesters.
Wielding clubs and knives, police and regime supporters described by protesters as government-sponsored thugs attacked activists camped out near the university, said Mohammed al-Abahi, a doctor in charge of a makeshift hospital nearby.
Among the 100 wounded Sunday in Sanaa, more than 20 suffered gas inhalation, and one was in critical condition after being struck with a bullet, the doctor said.
In the main square and in surrounding streets, eyewitnesses spoke of people being beaten up, threatened and going missing. The escalating violence came a day after security forces killed seven demonstrators in protests around the country.
In the city of Dar Saad in the southern province of Aden, medical officials said one protester was shot dead and three others wounded as police tried to disperse a demonstration. Earlier in the day, protesters torched three police cars and blocked roads to try to stop security troops from bringing in reinforcements.
The United States said it was concerned by the continuing violence in Yemen and called for it to stop.
“We call on the Yemeni government to quickly investigate these incidents,” State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said Monday. “People everywhere share the same universal rights to demonstrate peacefully and to freely assemble and express themselves.”
Unfazed by the violent tactics, young activists camped out in the square near the university continued to expand the area of their sit-in and threatened to march on the presidential palace about three miles away. Rock-throwing battles between protesters and security troops broke out on the edges of the encampment.
They said the authorities were trying to draw the protesters into a cycle of violence to further justify a crackdown.
“This will not happen. Even if they exterminate us all, our only weapon is peaceful sit-ins,” activist Abdel-Karim al-Khiwani said.
Protesters continued to pour into the main square Sunday, but many said they were stopped by thugs wielding iron rods, sticks, knives and machetes.
Mohoammed Abdel-Qader, a 27-year-old university student, said he was on a nearby street walking with a friend toward the square when two men armed with sticks and knives stopped them and told them they could not proceed to the university area for security reasons.
“When I tried to ask about the security reasons, he held up his stick menacingly and said: ’It’s none of your business. Go back where you came from,’” he said.
In the Aden province, demonstrators also stormed a police station, seizing weapons after the police fled, witnesses said. In Taiz province, clashes between demonstrators and police left at least four wounded, witnesses said.
Yemen has been hit by constant protests since mid-February. Even before that, the country’s government was weak and struggling to confront one of the world’s most active al Qaeda branches, a secessionist rebellion in the south and a Shi’ite uprising in the north.
The protests are part of a wave of unrest sweeping the region. Yemen’s demonstrators are calling for Mr. Saleh to step down, a demand he repeatedly has rejected while also trying to assuage opposition groups.
Mr. Saleh has said he would not seek another term in office in 2013 and offered to form a national unity government with opposition figures. These overtures have failed to satisfy the protesters.
On Sunday, Mr. Saleh sacked a close relative from a senior military post. The relative later announced his support for the protests.
Maj. Gen. Abdel-Illah al-Qadi told reporters he planned to visit protesters in Sanaa later Sunday. Gen. al-Qadi’s son, Mohammed, resigned earlier from the ruling Congress Party.
Resigned parliament member Abdel-Bari Degheish said a protester in Aden died Sunday from wounds he suffered a day earlier, bringing to seven the number of those killed during Saturday’s demonstrations.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.