Sanaa (AsiaNews / Agencies) - Yemeni President Abed Rabbo Mansour al-Hadi and Shiite Houthi militias, have reached an agreement to end the crisis after several days of violence and the taking of the presidential palace, along with the accumulation of important amount of weapons and military equipment.
According to
the text published by state news agency Saba, the rebels have agreed to abandon
the palace and release the chief of staff, Ahmad Awad ben Moubarak. In return,
the text of the new constitution will be changed, so that the Houthis and other
minorities will have a "fair representation" in State Institutions.
In addition, both the President and Houthi pledge to "normalize" the
situation in the capital immediately, where in recent days 35 people have been
killed and at least 94 injured.
The Houthis say they were excluded from the drafting of the Constitution, which provides for a federal state in six regions. The Houthi, mostly in the Northern region, maintain that the new configuration virtually cut the North off from access to the sea. In addition, they say that the designed subdivision divides the rich areas of the country from poor areas, condemning them to poverty.
In fact, the
country suffers from deep division, high levels of corruption and a lot of
poverty: Out of a population of about 26 million, at least 10 million living
below the poverty line.
The UN Security Council condemned the attempted coup by the Houthi group, even
if they had claimed that the President "was free". The Gulf
Cooperation Council, which includes Sunni kings and emirs, had defended
president Hadi. The Gulf countries fear the growing power of the Shiite group
because they see it as an ally of the Iranian enemy.
John Kerry, US Secretary of State, supported once the agreement reached
yesterday. The main enemy of the US in Yemen is the local branch of al Qaeda.
In recent weeks, the al Qaeda group in the Arabian Peninsula claimed
responsibility for the attacks in Paris on
Charlie Hebdo and the kosher shop, which killed 17 people.