President Saleh: Al-Houthi is a lawbreaker to be defeated

SANA’A,(Saba) – President Ali Abdullah Saleh said in press remarks published on Monday that the rebellion led by Hussein Badruddin al-Houthi in Saada province is against the constitutional legitimacy and would be defeated. In an interview with the Emirates al-Khaleej daily newspaper, President Saleh said that al-Houthi acts are “deviation form the constitutional and legitimacy committed by an extremist who has connections with foreign parties.” President Saleh said that subduing the rebellion is a “national and religious duty to stop the devil ideas which aims to disrupt Yemen.” On the regional arena, President Saleh called for establishing a joint security system for the Arab Gulf region. He said that Yemen is affected by any event in any gulf state and the regional and international developments reinforce the connection and cooperation between the states. Saleh affirmed that “Yemen would stick to democracy as a strategic choice and we can not retreat.” Yemen has an experience in the field of democracy and that reflects on people’s life, president Saleh said. He said that the mutual relations between Yemen and Gulf states are not controlled by the current developments but their relations are controlled by geography, history and economy. Asked about Yemen’s anti-terrorism efforts, President Saleh said Yemen had suffered during the last period from the terrorism phenomenon and Yemen was the first one who warned form terrorism and its danger. “Yemen used a typical way to treat that phenomenon by dialogue with militants instead of violence and it formed a theological dialogue committee consisted of a number of scholars to talk with those young people.” President Saleh also talked about the Yemeni-American mutual relations and affirmed that there is a coordination between the two countries to fight terrorism. “Yemen is not afraid to talking about its relations with America because those relations are on fighting terrorism,” Saleh said. Yemen participated in G-8 summit came as an appreciation of its democratic system, saying that “it represented an important chance to talk about our view over reform initiative in the Middle East.” JW/KMSABA