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Houthis intensify use of child soldiers, violating international law: HRW

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A Yemeni child lies in a bed at a hospital in the capital Sanaa on May 12, 2015, a day after he was wounded in an air strike by Saudi-led coalition hit an arms depot on the eastern outskirts of Sanaa. (AFP/Mohammed Huwais)

A Yemeni child lies in a bed at a hospital in the capital Sanaa on May 12, 2015, a day after he was wounded in an air strike by Saudi-led coalition hit an arms depot on the eastern outskirts of Sanaa. (AFP/Mohammed Huwais)

by Hayat Norimine, Al Bawaba

The Human Rights Watch called for an immediate stop to the use of child soldiers in Yemen’s armed groups Tuesday, as Houthi rebel group intensifies its recruitment of children to use in their fight against Yemen’s government loyalists.

The monitor said the groups’ use of child soldiers violates international law and should face prosecution. Since September 2014 the HRW said the armed militants have increasingly been using children, aged at least as young as 12, in the armed conflict. Some are used as scouts and first aid assistants, while others are trained to fight.

“All armed groups in Yemen should reject sending children to battle or using them to support fighting,” HRW special adviser Fred Abrahams said. “The cost to these young people – the trauma, the injuries, and the lost schooling – is huge, as is the cost to Yemen’s future.”

Children with the Houthis and other armed groups make up about a third of all fighters in Yemen, according to UNICEF. Armed groups have recruited at least 140 children in one month alone, from late March to April.

The HRW said there have been several reports of 14- to 16-year-old soldiers carrying rifles and handguns from all parties of the war. One witness told the organization of a 7-year-old Houthi fighter standing at a checkpoint with an assault rifle.

A Houthi recruiter told the organization the children in active combat receive military training, while others provide first aid, collect bodies, carry food and ammunition or serve as guards.

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon published a list of violations against children in May that included the use of children in armed forces by armed forces in Yemen.

The Human Rights Watch interviewed several children who had been recruited by the Houthis to fight in the war and wounded, including a boy who was shot in the chest and continued to fight after recovery.

Indonesia to 'turn back every boat carrying Rohingyas'

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Military says it would not allow boats as nearly 2,000 migrants arrive in Indonesia and Malaysia in past two days.

Indonesian paramedic assists a migrant child at a clinic after being rescued from a boat in Indonesia's Aceh province [Reuters]

Indonesian paramedic assists a migrant child at a clinic after being rescued from a boat in Indonesia’s Aceh province [Reuters]

by Al Jazeera

Indonesian military has told Al Jazeera that they will send back any boat with Rohingya migrants entering its waters as a vessel carrying hundreds of migrants from Myanmar and Bangladesh was turned away towards Malaysia.

Fuad Basya, Indonesian military spokesman, said that they pulled back a boat “full of people in dire conditions, smelling bad, some were screaming”, adding that they provided the migrants with water, food, medicine and fuel.

AFP news agency reported that the boat carrying an estimated 400 migrants was intercepted on the coast of northwestern Aceh region on Monday.

Meanwhile, rights groups have urged regional governments to save thousands of migrants believed to be stranded at sea in Southeast Asia and at the risk of death.

An estimated 6,000 to 8,000 Bangladeshis and Rohingya Muslims from Myanmar remain trapped in crowded, wooden boats, officials and activists said on Tuesday.

Nearly 2,000 people have reached Malaysia and Indonesia in the past two days after Thailand announced a crackdown on smuggling routes. They were rescued from overcrowded boats after being stranded at sea.

Myanmar shirks responsibility

Even as a large number of migrants originated from Myanmar, its government said that they will not take responsibility for migrants who are not their own citizens.

“If it is true and proven that they are from Myanmar, we will take responsibility for them. But not the Bangladeshis,” Zaw Htay, the director of Myanmar’s president’s office told Al Jazeera.

“Some of the Rohingya people may have come from Bangladesh. We can’t be responsible for them. But we do not accept the name Rohingya. They are Bengali,” Htay added referring to Myanmar’s long-persecuted Rohingya Muslim community.

The Rohingya, who are Muslim, have for decades suffered from state-sanctioned discrimination in Buddhist-majority Myanmar, which considers them illegal settlers from Bangladesh even though their families have lived there for generations.

Those comments come a day after more than a 1,000 migrants, including children from both countries, were detained in Malaysia after they arrived in the popular Malaysian resort island of Langkawi.

The police chief in Langkawi told Al Jazeera’s Karishma Vyas that 1,158 people were being held on the island. At least 672 are Bangladeshi, and around 486 of them are Rohingya Muslims from Myanmar.

At least 100 women and 60 children were among them. The migrants were in a very poor state, suffering from dehydration as well as hunger.

The police say they believe the captain as well as the other traffickers on the three boats had escaped in another vessel and left the migrants to their own devices.

Regional problem

The Arakan Project, a group advocating for the rights of Rohingya, has said as many as 8,000 people may be adrift.

Chris Lewa, the director of Arakan Project, told Al Jazeera that “there were at least three other boats near Langkawi island in Malaysia – one of them in distress” on Monday night.

She said that a big concern is where these migrants could go, and despite this being a regional problem, if there was any country willing to deal with them.

Earlier, the International Organisation for Migration called on Southeast Asian governments to find and rescue the migrants trapped at sea.

Joe Lowry, a spokesman for the organisation, told Al Jazeera that some of the migrants may have been at sea since early March.

He said that from what they’ve seen so far, many of the migrants who make it to the shore are in poor health, with some suffering from vitamin B deficiency and acute malnutrition.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has said 25,000 people are believed to have embarked from January to March, double the previous year’s pace, and that an estimated 300 had died.

Nearly 2,000 people have reached Malaysia and Indonesia in the past two days [Reuters]

Malaysia detains hundreds of Rohingya Muslim migrants arriving on boats

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At least 1,000 migrants, including many Rohingya Muslims, sent to detention centres after landing on island of Langkawi.

Rohingya Muslims

by Al Jazeera

Malaysian police say more than 1,000 migrants from Myanmar and Bangladesh have been found “illegally” trying to enter the country at the popular resort island of Langkawi.

The 1,018 migrants, many thought to be members of Myanmar’s long-persecuted Rohingya Muslim community, landed on Langkawi late on Sunday night.

“The first capture by the police was made when a boat with the illegal immigrants was stranded at the beach in Langkawi, [and] the second capture was at Tanjung Biawak, Kuala Temonyong,” said Mohd Yusof Abdullah, commander of the Langkawi marine police.

“All the illegal immigrants that have been arrested will be sent to detention centres,” he added in a statement.

Police told the AP news agency that officers received a tip-off from a local fisherman that the boats were coming ashore.

Al Jazeera’s Karishma Vyas, reporting from Kuala Lumpur, said that the migrants were found in “very poor condition,” suffering from severe thirst and hunger.

The migrants were found a day after boats carrying about 500 members of Myanmar’s long-persecuted Rohingya community washed ashore in western Indonesia.

The men, women and children arrived on two separate boats, one carrying around 430 people and the other 70, said Steve Hamilton, deputy chief of mission at the International Organisation for Migration in Jakarta, Indonesia’s capital.

Last week, the UN’s refugee agency said in a statement that an estimated 25,000 Rohingyas and Bangladeshis boarded people smugglers’ boats in the first three months of 2015, twice as many in the same months of 2014.

“Based on survivor accounts, we estimate that 300 people died at sea in the first quarter of 2015 as a result of starvation, dehydration and abuse by boat crews,” the statement said.

In the past weeks dozens of corpses , believed to be of Rohingya, were found in Thai jungles bordering Malaysia.

Rohingya Muslims have for decades suffered from state-sanctioned discrimination in Myanmar.

Attacks on the religious minority by Buddhist mobs in the last three years have sparked one of the biggest exoduses of boat people since the Vietnam War, sending 100,000 people fleeing, according to Chris Lewa, director of the Arakan Project, which has monitored the movements of Rohingya for more than a decade.

Hosni Mubarak sentenced to three years in jail for corruption

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The former president of Egypt and two sons are also handed fines over embezzlement during his rule.

Former Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak was accused of ordering the killings of hundreds of people during the 2011 Arab Spring that resulted in his ouster.

Former Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak was accused of ordering the killings of hundreds of people during the 2011 Arab Spring that resulted in his ouster.

by Al Jazeera

An Egyptian court has sentenced ousted president Hosni Mubarak and his two sons to three years in prison for embezzlement.

Mubarak and his sons Alaa and Gamal were present in the caged dock on Saturday, wearing suits and sunglasses.

They had already been sentenced to three years on the same charges but an appeal court overturned the verdict and ordered a retrial.

The trio were also fined $16m.

Mubarak’s lawyers may try to appeal the verdict, the AFP news agency reported.

Supporters shouted in anger as Judge Hassan Hassanin announced his verdict and it was not immediately clear whether it will include time he has already served since his country’s 2011 revolt.

Some of those backing Mubarak wore T-shirts emblazoned with the former leader’s face. They waved and blew kisses as the 87-year-old entered the courtroom, according to the Associated Press.

Omar Ashour, a lecturer in Arab and Islamic Studies at the University of Exeter, told Al Jazeera the sentencing would be seen as “nothing” by Egyptians who protested to end Mubarak’s rule.

“When we see the series of brutal abuses that happened under Mubarak in his 30-year reign, it will be seen as nothing, especially when we look at the trial happening now of former-President Mohamed Morsi,” he said.

“It tells you that there is very high politicisation of the judiciary.”

The corruption case, dubbed by the Egyptian media as the “presidential palaces” affair, concerns charges that Mubarak and his two sons embezzled millions of dollars worth of state funds over the course of a decade.

The funds were meant to pay for renovating and maintaining presidential palaces but were instead allegedly spent on upgrading the family’s private residences.

Mubarak was sentenced to three years, his sons to four in the case, prior to having the verdicts overturned.

The heaing, at a police academy on the outskirts of Cairo, took place in the same courtroom where Egypt’s first freely-elected president, Mohammed Morsi, was sentenced to 20 years in prison last month.

Four sentenced to death over brutal Afghan mob killing

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Afghan court begins ruling on woman’s murder case, sentencing four men to death by hanging and eight others to jail.

Prosecutors alleged Farkhunda was beaten to death in an attack sparked by a bogus accusation she had burned a copy of the Quran [AP]

Prosecutors alleged Farkhunda was beaten to death in an attack sparked by a bogus accusation she had burned a copy of the Quran [AP]

by Al Jazeera

An Afghan court has sentenced four men to death by hanging for their roles in the mob killing of a woman in March.

The trial of 49 suspects, who were accused of taking part in the mob that killed the 27-year-old, known as Farkhunda, began on May 2. Nineteen police officers were among those facing charges in the trial.

Of the suspects sentenced on Wednesday, four were sentenced to death, eight were sentenced to 16 years in jail and 18 were set free due to a lack of evidence, Al Jazeera’s Jennifer Glasse reported.

The judge adjourned the case until Saturday, when the remaining 19 will be sentenced.

Prosecutors have alleged that Farkhunda was beaten to death in a frenzied attack sparked by a bogus accusation that she had burned a copy of the Quran.

Glasse said the remaing 19 suspects are policemen, but their fate is still unclear.

“The 19 men still to be sentenced are policemen and that will be the interesting part of this trial because the Afghan law number 354 makes failure to render assistance a crime here and they too could be sentenced to jail,” she said

“Earlier this week the police said in court that they tried to to do their job and called for reinforcements but reinforcements did not come. The prosecutor told the police it is their job to protect her.

“This is really a test for the justice system, this case that has captured the attention of the nation. The trial has been televised live everyday and Afghans have been watching very closely.”

The defendants have the right to appeal their sentences. The charges included assault, murder and encouraging others to participate in the assault. The police officers were charged with neglecting their duties and failing to prevent the attack.

Mujub Ullah Farkunda, Farkhunda’s brother, told Al Jazeera they were not happy with the outcome.

“They have wasted our time. The trial only happened because of pressure from the government. The real perpetrators were not there.

“The government didn’t arrest the real murderers. They arrested innocent people off the street and have hidden the real perpetrators. There were more than 100 people involved and they sentenced only 4 to death,” Mujub added.

Farkhunda’s brutal killing shocked many Afghans, though some public and religious figures said it would have been justified if she had in fact damaged a Quran. A presidential investigation later found that she had not damaged a copy of the Muslim holy book.

Her last agonising and brutal hours were captured on mobile phone cameras by witnesses and those in the mob that attacked her. The videos of the assault circulated widely on social media.

They showed Farkhunda – who, like many Afghans, went by only one name – being beaten, run over with a car and burned before her bloodied body was thrown into the river.

The incident sparked nationwide outrage and soul-searching, as well as a civil society movement seeking to limit the power of clerics, strengthen the rule of law and improve women’s rights.

'Indiscriminate' killing in Gaza was top-down war plan, say Israeli soldiers

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Over 60 officers and soldiers who took part in ‘Operation Protective Edge’ anonymously testify about acts they committed or witnessed

gaza-war

by Sarah Lazare, Common Dreams

The “massive and unprecedented harm” inflicted on the population of Gaza during last summer’s 50-day Israeli military assault stemmed from the top of the chain of command, which gave orders to shoot indiscriminately at civilians, according to the anonymous testimony of more than 60 officers and soldiers who took part in “Operation Protective Edge.”

The Israeli group Breaking the Silence, an organization of “Israeli Defense Force” veterans who engaged in combat, on Monday released the 240-page collection of testimony entitled,This is How We Fought in Gaza.

“While the testimonies include pointed descriptions of inappropriate behavior by soldiers in the field,” the report states, “the more disturbing picture that arises from these testimonies reflects systematic policies that were dictated to IDF forces of all ranks and in all zones.”

Breaking the Silence said that the war on Gaza operated under the “most permissive” rules of engagement they have ever seen.

“From the testimonies given by the officers and soldiers, a troubling picture arises of a policy of indiscriminate fire that led to the deaths of innocent civilians,” said Yuli Novak, director of the group, in a press statement. “We learn from the testimonies that there is a broad ethical failure in the IDF’s rules of engagement, and that this failure comes from the top of the chain of command, and is not merely the result of ‘rotten apples.'”

Gaza is one of the most densely-populated places on earth—home to an estimated 1.8 million people, over 60 percent of whom are children under the age of 18. Approximately 2,194 Palestinians were killed in last summer’s attack, at least 70 percent of Palestinians killed in the assault were non-combatants, according to the United Nations. The assault damaged and destroyed critical civilian infrastructure—including houses, shelters, and hospitals—and nearly a year later, hardly any reconstruction has taken place and the civilian population remains strangled by an economic and military siege.

Numerous soldiers said that, during the war, they were told that all people in given areas posed a threat and were ordered to “shoot to kill” every person they spotted.

“The instructions are to shoot right away,” said an anonymous First Sergeant who deployed to Gaza City. “Whoever you spot—be they armed or unarmed, no matter what. The instructions are very clear. Any person you run into, that you see with your eyes—shoot to kill. It’s an explicit instruction.”

Some said they were lied to by their commanders, who told them there were no civilians present.

“The idea was, if you spot something—shoot,” said an anonymous First Sergeant identified in the report as having deployed to the Northern Gaza Strip. “They told us: ‘There aren’t supposed to be any civilians there. If you spot someone, shoot.’ Whether it posed a threat or not wasn’t a question, and that makes sense to me. If you shoot someone in Gaza, it’s cool, no big deal.”

Soldiers testified that thousands of “imprecise” artillery shells were fired into civilian areas, sometimes as acts of revenge or simply to make the military’s presence known. Civilian infrastructure was destroyed on a large scale with no justification, often after an area had already been “cleared,” they said.

“The motto guiding lots of  people was, ‘Let’s show them,'” said one Lieutenant who served in Rafah. “It was  evident that that was a starting point.”

One Staff Sergeant described perverse and deadly acts committed by soldiers:

During the entire operation the [tank] drivers had this thing of wanting to run over cars – because the driver, he can’t fire. He doesn’t have any weapon, he doesn’t get to experience the fun in its entirety, he just drives forward, backward, right, left. And they had this sort of crazy urge to run over a car. I mean, a car that’s in the street, a Palestinian car, obviously. And there was one time that my [tank’s] driver, a slightly hyperactive guy, managed to convince the tank’s officer to run over a car, and it was really not that exciting– you don’t even notice you’re going over a car, you don’t feel anything – we just said on the two-way radio: “We ran over the car. How was it?” And it was cool, but we really didn’t feel anything. And then our driver got out and came back a few minutes later – he wanted to see what happened – and it turned out he had run over just half the car, and the other half stayed intact. So he came back in, and right then the officer had just gone out or something, so he sort of whispered to me over the earphones: “I scored some sunglasses from the car.” And after that, he went over and told the officer about it too, that moron, and the officer scolded him: “What, how could you do such a thing? I’m considering punishing you,” but in the end nothing happened, he kept the sunglasses, and he wasn’t too harshly scolded, it was all OK, and it turned out that a few of the other company’s tanks ran over cars, too.

While numerous human rights organizations and residents have exposed war crimes committed during last year’s assault on Gaza, this report sheds light on the top-down military doctrine driving specific attacks by ground and air.

One First Sergeant explained that soldiers were taught to indiscriminately fire during training, before their deployments. “One talk I remember especially well took place during training at Tze’elim—before entering Gaza [the Gaza Strip]—with a high ranking commander from the armored battalion to which we were assigned. He came and explained to us how we were going to fight  together with the armored forces. He said, ‘We do not take risks, we do not spare ammo—we unload, we use as much as possible.'”

No Israeli soldiers, commanders, or politicians have been held accountable for war crimes, and the Israeli government has resisted international human rights investigations, from Amnesty International to the United Nations.

Breaking the Silence says it “meticulously investigates” testimony to ensure its veracity. The group garnered global media headlines when it launched a report featuring testimony from Israeli soldiers who took part in the 2009 military assault on Gaza known as “Operation Cast Lead.” In that report, soldiers testified about indiscriminate attacks on civilians, including use of chemical weapon white phosphorous.

Coalition dropping US-made cluster bombs on Yemen

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Human rights group warns that cluster munitions have fallen near villages, posing long-term danger to civilians

An expended BLU-108 canister from a CBU-105 Sensor Fuzed Weapon found in the al-Amar area of al-Safraa, Saada governorate, in northern Yemen on April 17, 2015. (Photo via HRW.org)

An expended BLU-108 canister from a CBU-105 Sensor Fuzed Weapon found in the al-Amar area of al-Safraa, Saada governorate, in northern Yemen on April 17, 2015. (Photo via HRW.org)

by Lauren McCauley, Common Dreams

The Saudi-led bombing campaign against rebels in Yemen is using U.S.-supplied cluster munitions, endangering civilians and violating an international arms treaty, Human Rights Watch warned on Sunday.

According to the group, there is “credible evidence” that cluster bombs have been used in recent weeks as part of coalition airstrikes in Yemen’s northern Saada governorate, a Houthi stronghold that borders Saudi Arabia. Through analysis of satellite imagery, Human Rights Watch charges that the weapons landed on a “cultivated plateau, within 600 meters of several dozen buildings in four to six village clusters.”

Cluster bombs, which are composed of hundreds of submunitions, pose a long-term threat to civilians because they are designed to explode after spreading over a wide area. Often, the submunitions do not explode, causing the bombs to become de facto landmines.

Over one hundred countries signed the 2008 Convention on Cluster Munitions banning their use. However, the United States, Saudi Arabia, and Yemen all abstained from signing on.

According to a U.S. Defense Department contract, Saudi Arabia purchased 1,300 CBU-105 Sensor Fuzed cluster munitions from Textron Defense Systems, which is based in Wilmington, Mass. The shipment was meant to be completed by December 2015. Additionally, the UAE received an unknown number of CBU-105 from Textron Defense Systems in June 2010, HRW reports.

“Saudi-led cluster munition airstrikes have been hitting areas near villages, putting local people in danger,” said Steve Goose, arms director at Human Rights Watch. “These weapons should never be used under any circumstances. Saudi Arabia and other coalition members – and the supplier, the US – are flouting the global standard that rejects cluster munitions because of their long-term threat to civilians.”

Pakistani court sentences 10 to life imprisonment in Malala attack case

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AFP PHOTO / PAUL ELLIS

AFP PHOTO / PAUL ELLIS

by Ali Akbar & Mohammad Zubair Khan, Dawn

Swat: An anti-terrorism court of Swat on Thursday sentenced ten men to 25 years imprisonment in the case related to the 2012 attack on child activist Malala Yousufzai.

The ten convicts were identified as Bilal, Shaukat, Salman, Zafar Iqbal, Israrullah, Zafar Ali, Irfan, Izhar, Adnan and Ikram.

The Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) had claimed the attack on Malala in October 2012 as the then 14-year-old was returning from her school in the Mingora town of Swat valley. Two schoolmates of the educationist, Kainat and Shazia, were also wounded in the attack.

Malala survived after being airlifted to Britain for treatment and recovered from her life-threatening wounds.

Her courage was recognised and praised worldwide and she was nominated for several international peace awards. She became the youngest Nobel peace prize winner in October 2014.

Pakistan Army had claimed in Sept 2014, the arrest of 10 Taliban terrorists involved in the attack on Malala Yousufzai and announced they would be tried under anti-terror laws.

The arrests were made on information provided by Israrullah, one of the alleged shooters, who was the first to be arrested.

All ten suspects hailed from Malakand division and had been arrested during several intelligence-led joint operations which involved the army’s Swat-based formation, ISI, Military Intelligence and police.

Zafar Iqbal, a furniture shop owner in Swat, was the main accused and led the group.

In a surprise move, Saudi Arabia’s monarch shakes up line of succession

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by Hugh Naylor & Liz Sly, Washington Post

King-Salman

Beirut: Saudi Arabia’s new monarch, King Salman, announced a major shift within the nation’s royal family on Wednesday, replacing his anointed heir with his nephew and naming his own son as the second in line to the throne.

The royal decrees, read on state television before dawn, thrust a younger generation of princes closer to the pinnacle of power at a time of growing challenges for the Western-allied kingdom.

On a regional level, Saudi leaders are facing pressure from several quarters — extremist groups such as the Islamic State; Iran, the country’s increasingly influential rival; and rebels who have seized much of neighboring Yemen.

At home, Saudi Arabia must cope with declining oil prices and the difficulties of ensuring employment for a growing population. About half of Saudi citizens are younger than 30.

The new line of succession signals a potential ideological shift as the kingdom moves away from policies matched lock-step with Washington’s and increasingly establishes its own security and foreign affairs initiatives.

“This change positions [Saudi Arabia] toward leaders who feel that they are facing serious threats from Iran as well as from issues like terrorism,” said Riad Kahwaji, head of the Dubai-based Institute for Near East and Gulf Military Analysis. “They feel they have no choice but to be more assertive with their foreign policy.”

In the decrees, Salman promoted his nephew, Mohammed bin Nayef, 55, from deputy crown prince to crown prince. Unless there are further shake-ups, that means that Nayef — currently the interior minister — will become king when the 79-year-old Salman dies.

Salman also named his son, Mohammed bin Salman, as deputy crown prince, putting him second in line to the throne and ensuring that the kingdom’s future rulers will come from Salman’s own branch of the extensive royal family. Mohammed bin Salman, currently the defense minister, is believed to be about 30.

The changes represent the biggest royal shake-up in Saudi Arabia in years and offer yet another indicator that Salman is proving a more energetic and decisive leader than his predecessor, King Abdullah, who died in January at age 90.

A major driver of that assertiveness is concern over Iran, a Shiite powerhouse and the chief rival of predominantly Sunni Saudi Arabia. Riyadh has grown increasingly alarmed by Tehran’s expanding influence in Iraq and its role in Syria’s civil war, in which it is bolstering forces loyal to the regime of President Bashar al-Assad.

The Saudi government’s decision to launch an air war against Shiite rebels in Yemen in March is widely seen in the region as an example of a turn to a more forceful foreign policy.

Mohammed bin Salman, who was appointed defense minister after Salman took power in January, has assumed a high-profile role in the Yemeni military campaign, which Saudi leaders have portrayed as necessary to counter Iranian influence in the region. Iran denies it provides direct aid to the Yemeni rebels.

The succession moves squeeze out Prince Muqrin, the late King Abdullah’s choice to succeed Salman. Abdullah had named Muqrin, his younger half-brother, as deputy crown prince two years ago, in what was widely seen as an effort to secure the crown for an ally of his own sons.

Nayef is the first of the grandchildren of the late Abdul Aziz ibn Saud, the founder and first king of Saudi Arabia, to move to the doorstep of the country’s top ruling position.

Whether the succession will proceed exactly as Salman plans is in question, however.

King Abdullah set a precedent when he named a deputy heir. Salman, however, has set his own standard by dismissing his predecessor’s choice for the No. 2 person in line for the throne.

There have long been concerns that the transfer to the second generation of the family could trigger destabilizing rivalries between the hundreds of princes potentially eligible to rule the strategically important nation, one of closest Arab allies of the United States.

Salman also replaced 75-year-old Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal, who had been in the job for four decades. His successor is the ambassador to the United States, Adel al-Jubeir, who is 53. The king announced other changes that will bring younger blood into the kingdom’s aging administration.

Mohammed Obeid, a political analyst from Lebanon, said Saudi officials have grown increasingly alarmed over a potential U.S.-Iran rapprochement as those two countries negotiate an agreement over Tehran’s nuclear program.

“These new leaders in Saudi are moving in a different direction than the United States, and their policies in the region are an example of this,” Obeid said.

Nonetheless, Nayef has strong ties with officials in Washington. Those links were cultivated in his role over the past decade in overseeing domestic counterterrorism programs, which included crackdowns on members of al-Qaeda as well as rehabilitation programs for militants.

According to Saudi media reports, Nayef has been targeted in at least four assassination attempts by al-Qaeda militants, including one in 2009 that was carried out at his home in the city of Jiddah.

“He’s clearly well known for the counterterror campaign, he’s responsible for Saudi Arabia’s de-radicalization program, and he’s very close to policymakers in Washington,” said Theodore Karasik, a Dubai-based expert on Middle Eastern military issues. “It’s assumed that he’s in close contact with them constantly.”

Still, there have been tensions with the U.S. government over allegations of human rights abuses committed by Saudi authorities against domestic dissidents and over Saudi practices such as public beheadings of convicted criminals.

Daniela Deane in London contributed to this report.

Hunger and death stalk millions in Yemen's war

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(Photo: UNICEF)

(Photo: UNICEF)

by Mohammed Mukhashaf and Noah Browning, Reuters

Aden/Dubai: Hospitals bereft of electricity, homes crushed by air strikes, thousands on the move in search of water, shelter and food: Yemen’s humanitarian plight, long fragile, has become disastrous after a month of all-out war.

In a reversal of a journey long undertaken by those fleeing disaster, war and famine, some Yemenis have resorted to escaping to less unstable zones in the Horn of Africa.

Hospitals in the capital Sanaa, too short of gasoline to run ambulances, blared appeals to private drivers with enough fuel to collect the dead and injured lying in the street after a big air strike on capital Sanaa last week.

The bombing of a missile depot set off a explosion which shredded dozens of homes and sent a mushroom cloud towering over the city.

Crammed with wounded people, some hospitals lacked the electricity or generator fuel to perform surgery, and aid officials say some bodies are now being stored in commercial refrigerators or hastily buried when fetid morgues lack power.

“Ambulances can’t run, there’s very little electricity and not enough fuel for generators. In a water-scarce country like Yemen, that means you can’t even pump water,” said International Committee of the Red Cross spokeswoman Marie Claire Feghali.

“It’s a catastrophe, a humanitarian catastrophe. It was difficult enough before, but now there are just no words for how bad it’s gotten,” she added.

Hundreds of Saudi-led air strikes and dozens of ground battles across Yemen have left millions in the impoverished country hungry and 150,000 fleeing for their lives.

At least 1,080 people have been killed, according to the United Nations, their bodies often crushed under bombed homes or left to fester in war zones. More than 4,000 have been wounded.

An Arab alliance’s month-long campaign against Iran-allied Houthi rebels has yet to loosen their grip over the capital Sanaa or beat back their gains in fronts across hundreds of miles in Yemen’s south.

Behind the struggle for the country’s future, average Yemenis bear the brunt of fighting. The United Nations say 12 million people are “food insecure” or going hungry, a 13 percent increase since the conflict started.

A blockade has choked off imports of food and medicines, while combat has interrupted fuel supplies to the country’s 25 million people.

The shortages have warped daily life and crippled hospitals.

Hisham Abdul Wahab, a resident of the district lashed by last week’s blast, said he tried but failed to stay on.

“Some people began returning to the neighborhood, but the strikes began again and now they’re leaving a second time. The place is devastated: there are no roads, no water and no electricity. Nobody’s left but thieves,” he said.

EXODUS

The tank and machine gun fire became too much for Samad Hussein Shihab and his family last week. He, his young children and elderly mother left their homes in the town of Houta and trekked by foot over sandy wastes to a village an hour away.

“It was the only way to protect my family. Houta is a total disaster area, with almost no civilians remaining. 3,000 families have left and they are suffering badly,” he said.

While he has now reached the relative safety of Aden and was taken in by kin, the city is itself shaken by clashes between Houthi militiamen and armed locals.

Snipers’ bullets and Katyusha rockets have rendered roads into town virtually impassable, preventing aid supplies getting in and desperate citizens from getting out.

Residents say dozens from the city have taken to rickety fishing boats seeking refuge in Somaliland and Djibouti, lands even poorer than Yemen but now more peaceful.

For those who remain, hope, along with basic staples of life, are in short supply.

“Displaced people are camped out in abandoned school grounds and people in the city are sitting through the shelling with no food and no electricity,” said local aid worker Wissam al-Hiswa.

“We are more desperate than a person sitting on a red-hot coal to get food into this city, but over the last week only 22 tons have gotten in, and we have nothing to provide,” he added.

Saudi Arabia announced last week that it would scale back its strikes and step up aid efforts, in a pause that was demanded by rights and aid groups.

The kingdom pledged $274 million to fully cover a U.N. humanitarian aid appeal for Yemen this month and has allowed aid agencies to ship hundreds of tons of medicine.

But air strikes hit a displaced persons camp, killing at least 40, and a humanitarian warehouse for aid agency Oxfam.

For many tens of thousands of people fleeing remote conflict zones, like Bakeel Saleh from the city of Dalea tucked among mountains in Yemen’s south, peace and relief look distant.

“There are no supplies or aid organizations around to help the thousands who fled the city into surrounding villages,” Saleh said.

“The main hospital and most people’s homes have been hit by the shelling. Our house was among them – it’s destroyed.” he added.

(Additional reporting by Mohammed Ghobari; Writing By Noah Browning, Editing By William Maclean and Philippa Fletcher)

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