Agencies/Aden
A separatist activist was shot dead in southern Yemen yesterday as secessionists staged a day of civil disobedience, witnesses and activists said of a killing Amnesty International called an “execution”.
Khaled al-Junaidi, a prominent figure in the Southern Movement, was shot in the chest when security forces opened fire while trying to arrest him, activists said.
Junaidi was released from prison earlier this month after serving five months for separatist activities, and had been preparing to take part in yesterday’s day of action, witnesses said.
Amnesty called on the authorities to investigate his killing, describing it as an “extrajudicial execution”.
“Yemeni authorities have an obligation under international law to ensure that an independent, impartial and prompt investigation into this killing is conducted, and that all those responsible are brought to justice, including anyone who ordered the killing,” Amnesty’s deputy regional director Said Boumedouha said in a statement.
The London-based watchdog said five masked security officers ordered Junaidi out of his car, and one of them shot him.
They then drove Junaidi to a nearby hospital and left him at the entrance, it added.
Most businesses and schools in Aden were closed in response to the call for the demonstration to demand the secession of the formerly independent south.
South Yemen became independent after the end of British colonial rule in 1967, before it joined the north in 1990. Secessionists failed in a civil war in 1994 to reverse the unification.
Since mid-October, the Southern Movement has staged a sit-in in central Aden to demand secession.
Elsewhere yesterday, a street vendor was shot dead by southern separatists in Hadramout province in southeast Yemen, witnesses said.
The gunmen opened fire as the man, who was from north Yemen, failed to stop at a checkpoint, triggering a confrontation between the militants and other residents of northern origin.
Rising demands for separation by southern separatists have been one of several challenges facing President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi since he took office three years ago after mass protests forced his predecessor Ali Abdullah Saleh to step down.
Separatists say Sanaa has plundered the former socialist South Yemen in favour of northern officials, especially under Saleh’s rule, and treats them as second class-citizens.
Hadi’s government has vowed to correct wrongs against southern Yemenis and compensate thousands of civil servants or former army officers and soldiers fired from their posts after the 1994 war, or restore many to their posts.
Apart from southern separatists, Hadi’s government faces an Al Qaeda threat in the south and eastern part of the country and a major challenge from Shia Houthi militias who seized control of Sanaa in September in what they said was a drive against corruption but are refusing to quit.
Houthi militiamen bury the bodies of their comrades who were killed two days ago in clashes with armed tribesmen, during a funeral in Sanaa yesterday.
