ADEN, Yemen (Reuters)(CNBC)
- Yemeni
security forces shot dead three men in south Yemen on Friday and wounded seven
others at demonstrations by southern separatists, protest leaders said, but
officials said protesters had attacked security personnel and soldiers.
A man was shot by a sniper as he
marched with several hundred protesters in Aden who were trying to get into a
public square in the Mansoura district of the Arabian Sea port city, said
Hussein Zaid bin Yahya, a leader of the Southern Movement.
Security forces and the army had
tried to block the protesters' way near the square, Yahya said.
A security official said that
"armed elements in the march" had fired on security forces and the army. He
could not confirm the protester's death.
The march was held to commemorate
the day in 1994 that government forces from Sanaa stormed Aden at the end of a
brief civil war. Aden was the capital of the former South Yemen until
unification in 1990.
In the town of Sai'oun in the
southeast region of Hadramaut, a man was shot dead and three others wounded when
security forces attacked another demonstration marking the same occasion, a
Southern Movement activist said.
When asked to comment on the
report, a security source said security forces had taken action against
protesters who attacked shops owned by northern Yemenis.
Yemen, an impoverished Arabian
Peninsula state that straddles major shipping routes, has been in turmoil since
an uprising against veteran ruler Ali Abdullah Saleh began last year after the
successful Arab Spring uprising in Tunisia.
Saleh stepped down in February but
the divisions remain.
The U.S.-backed government is
battling al Qaeda-linked militants who have become further entrenched in parts
of the south in the past year and who have tried to use their foothold to stage
attacks in Saudi Arabia and the United States.
The ministry of defence said on
Friday that unidentified gunmen attacked a government building in Dalea province
in the south with grenades and gunshots.
It also said that security forces
defused an explosive device found in front of the tax authority building in
Aden.
(Reporting by Mohammed Mukhashaf;
Writing by Andrew Hammond; Editing by Louise Ireland)
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Fire on peaceful protesters
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