Sanaa, June 3
Yemen's embattled President Ali Abdullah Saleh was wounded today along with his premier and other officials as shells struck a mosque in the presidential palace compound.

The mosque attack came as fighting that has killed scores of people in north Sanaa spread to the south of the capital and the poverty-stricken Arabian Peninsula country teetered towards civil war.

Four officers of the elite Republican Guard were killed when two shells crashed into the mosque, the official said. Saleh himself "was lightly wounded in the attack" on the palace mosque in Sanaa, a security official said. The extent of Prime Minister Ali Mohammed Mujawar's injuries were not immediately clear.

In an assurance to the Yemeni public, state television later said that the President was "well." A source close to the presidency told AFP that Yemen's deputy prime minister for defence and security, General Rashad al-Alimi was "critically wounded and hospitalised." The attack was blamed by the authorities on dissident tribesmen loyal to Sheikh Sadiq al-Ahmar, who have been locked in fierce clashes with government forces in north Sanaa since Tuesday.

"The Ahmar (tribe) have crossed all red lines," said Tareq al-Shami, spokesman for the ruling General People's Congress.

Earlier today, Yemeni troops, who have deployed heavy weaponry in their battle against the tribesmen, sent a shell crashing into the home of Sheikh Hamid al-Ahmar, a leader of the biggest opposition party and brother of Sheikh Sadiq.

Three shells also struck near the university campus in the city centre where opponents of Saleh have been holding a sit-in since late January. After a brief lull at dawn, artillery and heavy machine-gun fire rocked the Al-Hassaba neighbourhood of northern Sanaa where Sheikh Sadiq has his base, witnesses said. They said that during the fighting the headquarters of national airline Yemenia was burnt down and the offices of Suhail TV, a channel controlled by Sheikh Sadiq, destroyed.

There was no immediate word on casualties from the latest fighting as medics said ambulance crews were unable to access the battlegrounds. Even as the fighting raged into a fourth straight day, rival demonstrators took to the streets of Sanaa, witnesses said.

Hundreds of anti-Saleh demonstrators gathered at Change Square, near the university, for a day of solidarity with Taez where security forces this week smashed a months-long sit-in protest at a cost of more than 50 lives.

Troops loyal to dissident General Ali Mohsen al-Ahmar were deployed to protect the protesters, although positions held by the rebel army units also came under artillery fire. — AFP 

Islamabad, June 3
The Taliban have vowed to launch more “high-profile” attacks against the government and military installations in Pakistan, saying that the terror group’s aim is to force the authorities here to end their alliance with the US.

Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) leader Maulana Faqir Mohammad said his group, which was earlier focusing on the war in Afghanistan, had changed its strategy and would now launch more large-scale attacks against Pakistani security forces like the one on the PNS Mehran naval airbase in Karachi and assaults that targeted border check posts in Dir region of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province.

Individual strikes by militants in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa and other parts of Pakistan will continue but the “preferred option would be to mount high-profile attacks against government and military installations,” Mohammad told The News daily.

Mohammad, who was deputy head of the TTP before disappearing from the scene last year amid reports that he had patched up with the government, spoke to the media after a considerable gap.

The commander “appeared determined to carry on his fight with the Pakistani state,” the report said.

Mohammad’s remarks marked the first time that a TTP commander has explained the group’s new strategy. “Our new strategy of launching big attacks on military installations was aimed at causing demoralisation in the ranks of the security forces and tiring out the government. We also want to limit civilian casualties. Our ultimate objective is to force the government to end its alliance with the US,” Mohammad said.

Ten security personnel were killed and two US-made surveillance aircraft destroyed when a small band of heavily armed Taliban fighters attacked the PNS Mehran base in Karachi on May 22. — PTI

BRIEFLY

PRIZED POSSESSION: Sukanya Roy of Pennsylvania with the trophy after winning the 2011 Scripps National Spelling Bee competition. — AFP

Indian-American is Spelling Bee champ
Washington: Indian-origin students have triumphed four times in a row in the prestigious Spelling Bee championship of the US with Sukanya Roy (14) correctly spelling the tongue-twister 'cymotrichous' to be crowned the new champion. Sukanya spelt the word "cymotrichous", which relates to wavy hair, correctly to win the coveted prize. This is the fourth year in succession and ninth time in 13 years that an Indian American has been declared a Spelling Bee champion. — PTI