Two dead as Yemen disperses Aden independence protests
Yemeni forces shot dead one protester and wounded 16 others as they opened fire on defiant secessionist demonstrators in the southern city of Aden yesterday, hours after killing another.
Two years after the ouster of veteran strongman Ali Abdullah Saleh, secessionist leaders called for anniversary demonstrations to press their campaign for the restoration of the independence that the south enjoyed until union with the north in 1990.
Thousands of protesters marched on Aden's central government and diplomatic district of Khor Maksar after the main weekly Muslim prayers, an AFP correspondent reported.
But police fired live rounds as well as tear gas at the protesters as they neared the district's central Arood Square defying a ban on protests in the area.
One person was killed and 16 wounded, a medical source said. Activists said dozens more suffered from the effects of tear gas inhalation.
"The south is a state and an identity," the protesters chanted.
Police opened fire on a similar protest march on Khor Maksar late on Thursday, killing one demonstrator and wounding 12, medics said.
Video footage posted online showed police firing tear gas to disperse dozens of protesters as they held evening prayers out in the open.
Authorities announced a ban on all gatherings in the area, citing "extraordinary security conditions... and the need to pre-empt terrorist acts."
Aden's top security committee said only peaceful demonstrations with prior authorisation would be tolerated.
But the protest organisers vowed to press ahead with their plans for a new march on Arood Square in defiance of the ban.
Saleh, who stepped down on February 21, 2012, after 11 months of deadly Arab Spring-inspired protests against his 33-year rule, led the crushing of a southern secession bid in 1994, which resulted in the occupation of the south by northern troops.
Security forces killed eight demonstrators in Aden on the first anniversary of his ouster and yesterday's protests were also called to commemorate their deaths.
Saleh's successor, his long-time vice president Abdrabuh Mansur Hadi, had been due to step down on Friday at the end of a two-year transition but his term of office was extended in the face of persistent political unrest.
His government's plans for the unitary state to be replaced by a six-region federation have run into strong opposition both from southern independence activists and from leaders of a decade-old rebellion in the Zaidi Shiite northern highlands of the mainly Sunni Muslim country.
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