Yemen leader loses peer backing

SANAA, Yemen – A regional bloc of oil-rich Arab nations along the Gulf, including powerful Saudi Arabia, called on Yemen’s president Sunday to step down as part of a deal with the protest movement demanding his ouster after 32 years.

Keeping up the pressure, tens of thousands of protesters complaining of poverty and corruption marched in the capital, Sanaa, on Sunday, a day after renewed clashes between demonstrators and security forces there. Witnesses said police fired a barrage of tear gas late Saturday and that many demonstrators suffered breathing problems.

The statement, by foreign ministers of the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council meeting in the Saudi capital, called on President Ali Abdullah Saleh to transfer his powers to his vice president in return for promises that neither he nor his family would be prosecuted for any crimes committed under his leadership.

That falls short of protesters’ demands, which include seeing Saleh face justice. And Saleh himself has so far refused to immediately step down, saying he wants to first be certain the country is in “safe hands,” suggesting the already fragile and impoverished country could fall into serious tumult without him.

“The transfer of power ought to be in an easy and peaceful manner that would avoid sliding into chaos and violence, and as part of a national consensus,” said a Gulf council statement.

The embattled president, once a key U.S. ally in the war against the al-Qaida terror network, has tried to cling to power despite two months of near-daily protests calling for him to quit.

Last week, he rejected an earlier mediation offer by the Gulf Cooperation Council, saying the group was meddling in Yemen’s affairs. The council had invited Saleh and Yemen’s opposition groups to Saudi Arabia for talks on its proposal, similar to the one it endorsed Sunday.

The opposition called for nationwide protests, but the Interior Ministry warned against violation of the law that requires protests to be authorized.