SAUDI ATTACKS REPORTS IN YEMEN GROUNDLESS, MILITARY SOURCE SAYS

SANA'A, Nov. 05 (Saba) - Yemen on Thursday rejected claims by the
Houthi rebels that Saudi forces had conducted air raids targeting
Yemeni villages on common border.

A military source said the propagation of such move by Saudis was
baseless, adding the insurgents used to post lies in apparent
attempts to bring the two countries into conflict.

The Yemen-Saudi Arabia ties are above all this, the source affirmed.

The announcement by the rebel information office was also an attempt
to draw attention as the insurgents have started to lose their
strength amid intensive military operations against them in Saada
and Amran, the source said.

The army is continuing battling the rebels since August taking their
strongholds and killing and arresting hundreds of the Houthi
fighters.

This year's confrontations come within the year-long war against the
north-based insurgency that started in 2004 when the then-Houthi
leader, Hussein Badr al-Din al-Houthi who was killed in the same
year in battles with the troops, ordered his followers to take
weapons and fight the authorities.

The rebellion was aimed at reinstalling imamate rule and seeking
the autonomy of Saada province on the border with Saudi Arabia.

Yemen accuses Iranian religious authorities of supporting the
rebels, saying much evidence over Iranian involvement in its affairs
was collected and submitted to Iran.

FR