Yemeni forces kill 12 protesters as crackdown continues

Yemeni forces kill 12 protesters as crackdown continues

2011-10-16 06:10:39 GMT+7 (ICT)

SANAA (BNO NEWS) -- Yemeni police forces on Saturday fired at thousands of anti-government protesters in the country's capital, killing at least 12 people and injuring more than 50 others, medics said.

Protesters were marching in the capital of Sanaa to call for the ouster of President Ali Abdullah Saleh when police forces opened fire. Twelve people were killed and more than 50 protesters were wounded either by gunshots or smoke of tear gas bombs, according to the doctors.

"More than five bodies of protesters killed by gunshots of government security forces were taken to the opposition-run Technology and Science University Hospital," doctors told the Xinhua news agency.

Earlier, doctors at the field hospital of the Change Square told Xinhua that they received three bodies of protesters, while doctors in the opposition-run Azal hospital said they received four killed by gunshots apparently of government forces.

On Thursday, tens of thousands of people protested across Yemen to send a message to the international community to support their demands of change, freedom and a civil state.

Violence in Yemen has continued to escalate after President Saleh threatened with civil war after refusing, for a third time, to sign the Gulf Cooperation Council initiative for power transition on May 22. The uprising against President Ali Abdullah Saleh has claimed at least 1,500 lives since February.

Tensions have further escalated since Saleh returned to Yemen after spending more than three months in Saudi Arabia to recover from injuries he sustained in a rocket attack which hit the mosque of the presidential palace in Sanaa on June 3. Saleh has said he is planning to leave power 'in the coming days', although a ruling party official immediately said that Saleh has no intention to leave.

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