Yemeni Dictator Lands in UK en Route to US, While Yemenis Rally Demanding his Trial

Yemeni dictator lands in UK en route to US

Press TV, Sat Jan 28, 2012 7:19PM GMT

Yemeni dictator Ali Abdullah Saleh's plane has landed in Britain for refueling on its way to the United States, where the brutal dictator is due to receive medical treatment.

Saleh, who is due to step down next month as part of an Arab-brokered transition deal, has remained defiant, saying that he will return home to continue leading the ruling party in Yemen.

The U.S.-backed power-transfer deal has granted Saleh full immunity from prosecution, and the Yemeni parliament, which is controlled by Saleh loyalists has voted the immunity into law.

The law, that also grants limited immunity to Saleh's aides, sparked widespread protests all across the country by the people who want Saleh and his stooges to stand trial for the crimes they had committed against their own people.

They blame Saleh and his tribal family for deadly crackdown on months of anti-regime protest rallies, during which almost two thousand people have lost their lives.

The protesters also accuse Saleh of leading a corrupt regime during his long-time rule of the impoverished country.

Now, Britain and the U.S. have to support the immunity law for Saleh because basically he has been the creature of American foreign policy for some time and his brutal actions as the dictator of the country have basically been done at the behest of their foreign interests.

Saleh and other U.S-backed puppets have a long history of shedding the blood of their own people too.

In London, a Foreign Office spokesman confirmed that Saleh's plane was scheduled to land at a UK commercial airport on Saturday to refuel on the way to the United States.

After months of deadly protests, the Yemeni ruler finally signed up to a power transfer deal in November that effectively ended his three decades in power. He left Sanaa for Oman last Sunday with members of his family.

MOL/HE

Yemenis rally to demand Saleh's trial

SANAA, Jan. 27, 2012 (Xinhua) --

Tens of thousands of protesters staged rallies across Yemen on Friday to demand the prosecution of outgoing President Ali Abdullah Saleh for "ordering crackdown on the one-year-long anti-government protests."

The protesters in the capital Sanaa, and other major provinces including Taiz, Aden, Hadramout, Shabwa, Hajja and al-Hodayda, dubbed the day "Friday of Victory," referring to a power transfer deal that forced Saleh to deliver power to his deputy.

After the Friday prayers, the demonstrators chanted slogans denouncing a law that was approved last week to grant Saleh immunity from prosecution.

They also repeated their demand that the 33-year-ruler be put on trial over killing thousands of protesters last year, according to the witnesses.

"Our protests will continue until Saleh is tried," shouted the protesters in Sanaa.

Saleh left for Oman on Sunday, one day after the Yemeni parliament passed a law that grants him full immunity and protects his aides from political motivated charges as part of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) initiative signed by Saleh and the opposition in Saudi Arabia on Nov. 23, 2011.

He will travel to the United States to treat his injury caused in a bomb attack on his presidential compound in June, 2011.

Under the GCC deal, which put an end to the one-year-long protests demanding Saleh's resignation, the parliament unanimously nominated Vice President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi as the sole presidential candidate for the elections scheduled on Feb. 21.

In a farewell speech on Sunday, the outgoing president said he would return to Sanaa for Hadi's inauguration.

Editor: yan

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