Sanaa - Yemen President Ali Abdullah Saleh should hand over power to his vice president and allow the opposition to lead a transition government that would prepare new elections, Gulf Arab countries said on Sunday.
Saleh's government and the opposition will meet in Saudi Arabia to discuss Yemen's “unity, security and stability”, foreign ministers of the Gulf Cooperation Council said in a statement after talks in the Saudi capital.
“The formation of a national unity government under the leadership of the opposition which has the right to form committees...to draw up a constitution and hold elections,” was a key principle of the Gulf-sponsored meeting between the two sides, they said.
The meeting between the opposition and Saleh would be based on the understanding that Saleh transfers power to his vice president Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi. No date was scheduled for such a meeting.
As such, it would be based on the understanding that Saleh transfers power to his vice president Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi. No date was scheduled for the meeting.
The GCC, which comprises Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, has been pushing Saleh over the past week to hold talks with opposition parties after two months of protests against his 32-year-long rule.
But on Friday, Saleh - long regarded by the West as a vital ally against al-Qaeda militants - reacted angrily to comments from Qatar's prime minister saying the mediation would lead to him standing down.
“We don't get our legitimacy from Qatar or from anyone else ... We reject this belligerent intervention,” Saleh told tens of thousands of supporters in the capital. On Saturday Yemen said it would withdraw its ambassador from Doha.
A Gulf diplomat said Yemen had sought assurances that the GCC would only mediate and not dictate any outcomes.
“If there is a meeting it will be under the auspices of the GCC secretariat under one condition that the GCC will not get involved in the final decision,” he said. “The Yemenis won't agree to the talks in Saudi unless they get a promise from the GCC that they won't get involved.”
Qatar hosts the leading pan-Arab broadcaster Al Jazeera, whose Yemen correspondents have had their credentials revoked for what Sanaa calls bias. Saudi Arabia is a key financier of the Yemeni government as well as many Yemeni tribes on its border.
Concerned about any deals under the Gulf mediation plan that would delay Saleh's departure, tens of thousands of protesters marched in the capital Sanaa on Sunday.
“No, no to compromise,” chanted the crowd as they marched in the streets surrounding a weeks-long sit-in near Sanaa University.
Youth groups leading the sit-in later called for a campaign of civil disobedience in Sanaa on Monday and Wednesday to protest against “the persistent committing of bloody massacres of peaceful protesters...by Saleh's regime.”
Violent clashes have continued almost daily over the past week, with at least 27 people killed. Security forces have used live ammunition and teargas to rout protesters. - Reuters