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Saudi Arabia Evacuates Diplomats From a Yemen City as Houthi Advance Continues Ex-Yemeni Leader Urges Truce and Successor’s Ouster
(about 5 hours later)
CAIRO — Saudi Arabia said Saturday that its navy had evacuated 86 Arab and Western diplomats from the port city of Aden in southern Yemen, as a Saudi-led coalition conducted a third day of airstrikes against the Iranian-backed Houthi movement. CAIRO — Under pressure from a Saudi Arabian-led campaign of airstrikes, the former leader of Yemen who is backing the group that has seized the country’s largest cities said on Saturday that he was pleading for a truce, urging negotiations, but standing by demands for the ouster of his Saudi-backed successor.
Separately, Saudi Arabia confirmed that an American helicopter had rescued two Saudi pilots who ejected from an F-15 fighter over waters south of Yemen. The official Saudi Press Agency said the pilots had ejected because of a “technical fault” and were “in good health.” “Let’s go to dialogue and ballot boxes,” the former leader, Ali Abdullah Saleh, declared in a 10-minute address broadcast on Yemeni television.
The evacuation of the diplomats from Aden reflected the spreading chaos in Yemen as the Houthi-allied forces continued to advance, even under the pressure of the Saudi bombing. The breakdown of order has potentially grave consequences for the United States, because Yemen had been a central theater of the war with Al Qaeda, but the factional fighting has now forced the United States to withdraw its forces as well. Mr. Saleh rambled at times but sounded as though he still pictured himself as the leader, laying out plans and addressing foreign powers.
Aden is Yemen’s second largest city and had been the provisional headquarters of President Abdu Rabbu Mansour Hadi, the Saudi-backed Yemeni leader, since the Houthi forces overran the capital, Sana, in January. Mr. Hadi fled last month to Aden to make a last stand among his supporters in the south, but he, too, has now left Yemen, attending a meeting of Arab leaders on Saturday in Sharm el Sheikh, Egypt. Coming on the third day of airstrikes against his forces and his allies, the Houthi movement, Mr. Saleh’s speech might have reflected a degree of capitulation. But it also appeared intended to deflect blame for the bombing and to rally public anger against it. He gave no sign of an imminent end to the chaos engulfing Yemen, a central theater of the war with Al Qaeda and previously a crucial counterterrorism partner to the United States’s military.
The Houthi movement, based in northwestern Yemen, follows a form of Shiite Islam and has received financial support from Iran, the region’s Shiite power and the chief rival to Saudi Arabia. The Houthi surge has alarmed the Saudis about the possibility of an Iranian-backed group digging in on the southern tip of the Arabian Peninsula. It has been increasingly clear that Mr. Saleh played a critical role in the success of the northern-based Houthi movement as it swept south through the Yemeni capital, Sana, and a broad swath of the country. Important units of the military and security forces still loyal to Mr. Saleh, including the air force and the elite Republican Guard, switched sides to join the Houthis in their fight against the government, which is now led by President Abdu Rabbu Mansour Hadi.
But the Houthis have also struck an alliance with Yemen’s former strongman, Ali Abdullah Saleh, who retained significant support among the Yemeni military and security forces even after he was forced from power in 2012. Those forces have now fractured, and major factions have sided with Mr. Saleh and the Houthis against Mr. Hadi and his Saudi backers. But until Saturday, Mr. Saleh preferred to stand behind the Houthis, an Iranian-backed group that has fought for years against Yemen’s government. He has now stepped out in front.
Residents of Aden said Friday that fighting had broken out in pockets around the city. Houthi-allied forces were advancing. Military forces nominally working for Mr. Hadi had switched sides or deserted, and looters were pillaging military bases. Local militias with no affiliation with Mr. Hadi’s government were arming themselves to defend their neighborhoods or fight the Houthis. In a gesture of compromise, Mr. Saleh promised that neither he nor anyone in his family would run for president. His supporters have been actively campaigning for his eldest son, Ahmed, the former commander of Republican Guard, whose face has been appearing on campaign posters on the walls of the capital since the Saleh and Houthi forces took it over several months ago.
Commercial flights to Yemen have been cut off, and the Saudi-led coalition has blockaded the ports. But Mr. Saleh also made clear that he saw no room for the return of Mr. Hadi, even though Saudi Arabia and most other Arab states see him as Yemen’s legitimate leader.
The United States is providing intelligence and logistical support for the Saudi-led campaign, including conducting surveillance flights and providing refueling tankers, The Associated Press reported Saturday. State Department officials had said previously that the United States military was also helping the Saudis with targeting information. Mr. Hadi became president through a transitional pact brokered by Saudi Arabia and its Persian Gulf neighbors to remove Mr. Saleh and quell an Arab Spring uprising against him. But the Saleh and Houthi forces put him under house arrest in Sana until he escaped last month to make a last stand among his supporters in the southern port of Aden.
Defense Department officials said the helicopter that rescued the two Saudi pilots had flown from a base in Djibouti, a small African nation that lies across a narrow strait from Yemen, The Associated Press reported. A destroyer, the Sterett, and an amphibious transport dock, the New York, were also involved, the report said. Then, as the Houthi and Saleh forces closed in on Aden, Mr. Hadi disappeared again last Wednesday, turning up the next day in Saudi Arabia, then at a conference in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, and on Saturday, again, in Saudi Arabia.
The Houthi-controlled Interior Ministry in Sana said Saturday that at least 24 civilians were killed in Friday’s strikes, raising the two-day toll to 45 civilians as well as scores of fighters. Those numbers could not be confirmed. In his speech, Mr. Saleh called for elections to choose a new president, saying, “We would vote for him just as did with Hadi.”
Human Rights Watch said in a statement on Saturday that the Saudi-led air campaign had killed at least 11 and possibly as many as 34 civilians in Sana in the first two days of strikes. The group said that the 11 confirmed civilian deaths included two children. “I appeal to you and your conscience to protect your children and women in Yemen against these barbaric and unjustified strikes,” he said in his speech, apparently addressing both Yemenis and the Arab leaders lined up behind the Saudi Arabian-campaign against him.
Amnesty International reported that at least 14 civilian homes in a predominantly Houthi neighborhood of Sana had been destroyed. The Houthi movement, based in northwestern Yemen, follows a form of Shiite Islam and has received financial support from Iran, the region’s Shiite power and the chief rival to Saudi Arabia. That is what has alarmed the Saudis, who fear an Iranian-backed group digging in on the southern tip of the Arabian Peninsula.
Other strikes have hit the northern city of Saada, a center of the Houthi movement. The coalition’s forces have also struck the northern city of Hudaydah and the southern city of Taiz, as well as Aden, all places where the Houthis have made recent gains. Diplomats say that Iran has given money to the Houthis but does not control the group. But Mr. Hadi on Saturday called the Houthis “stooges of Iran.” Speaking at an Arab League meeting in Sharm el-Sheikh, Mr. Hadi urged Saudi Arabia and its allies to continue bombing until the Houthis surrendered, withdrew from the cities and turned over their weapons.
Saudi Arabia said on Saturday that its navy had evacuated 86 Arab and Western diplomats from Aden, which Mr. Hadi had made his provisional capital. Air travel to Yemen has been cut off, and the Saudi Arabian coalition has blockaded the coast.
Residents of Aden, with a population of at least several hundred thousand, said on Friday that fighting had broken out in pockets around the city. Military forces nominally working for Mr. Hadi had switched sides or deserted as the Houthis advanced. Looters were pillaging arms from military bases. Local militias with no affiliation with Mr. Hadi’s government were arming themselves to defend their neighborhoods or fight the Houthis.