Yemen’s Saleh Vows to Defend Regime with ‘Every Drop of Blood’ - Yemen’s Major Tribes Join Pro-Democracy Protesters

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After popular revolutions across the Arab world toppled the regimes of Egypt’s Husni Mubarak and Tunisia’s Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali, Yemen’s President Ali Abdullah Saleh, scared of the possibility to face the same fate, vowed to defend his three-decade regime "with every drop of blood".

Saleh, who accused on Sunday opponents of hijacking gathering protests in a ploy to split the nation, said that his opponents were trying to revive secessionist efforts that sparked a short-lived civil war in 1994.

"There is a conspiracy against Yemen's unity and territorial integrity and we, in the armed forces, have served to preserve the republican regime with every drop of blood we have," Saleh was quoted as saying by the state-run Saba news agency in a report on Sunday.

"We are trying in every way possible to deal with and overcome these difficulties democratically, through dialogue with all political leaders, but in vain."

His one concession has been to pledge not to seek re-election in 2013.

Meanwhile, a tally based on reports by medics and witnesses showed that at least 19 people have been killed in almost daily clashes since February 16.

Amnesty International has put the toll at 27, an average of nearly three killed every day, since the protests began. Most of the victims were killed in the southern city of Aden, with two in Sanaa and one in Taez in the north.

Pressure on Saleh to bow out intensified on Saturday when the leaders of Hashid and Baqil, two of Yemen's most important tribes, abandoned the president and joined the anti-regime movement.

A security source told AFP that five Southern Movement activists, including former diplomat Qassem Askar, had been arrested Sunday on suspicion of having fomented violence in a massive demonstration on Friday. The demonstration, dubbed "the beginning of the end" of his regime which swept to power in Sanaa in 1978, saw an estimated 100,000 Yemenis turn out across the country.

Human rights group Amnesty International has said it received reports the security forces refused to allow the wounded to be taken to hospital after the attack. But a Yemeni security official denied there was a police raid, blaming the deaths instead on the secessionist Southern Movement.

In the capital on Sunday, students maintained a sit-in outside Sanaa University, where they have vowed to remain until the fall of the Saleh regime. And in the city of Taez, south of Sanaa, protesters continued their second week camping out in a main square to demand Saleh stand down.

Yemen’s Major Tribes Join Pro-Democracy Protesters

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Yemen's Hashed and Baqil tribal confederations announced on Saturday that they had joined protests calling for President Ali Abdullah Saleh to step down, tribal sources told AFP.

"I have announced my resignation from the (ruling) General People's Congress (GPC) in protest at the repression of peaceful demonstrators in Sanaa, Taez and Aden," the source quoted Sheikh Hussein bin Abdullah al-Ahmar, head of the Hashid confederation, as saying.

The Hashid are considered Yemen's most powerful tribal confederation and encompass nine clans, including the Sanhan which has long been a bulwark of Saleh's power.

The announcement was warmly received by a large crowd of tribal representatives, including elders of Yemen's second largest confederation, the Baqil, who had gathered for the meeting, the tribal source said. The tribes wield enormous power in Yemen, where they are a major brake on the power of the central government.

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