[Saudi Arabia played down the decision, saying it was not yet a
final move because "the Pakistani government has not announced an official
position up till now," coalition spokesman Brigadier General Ahmed Asseri
told reporters on Friday.]
By
REUTERS
ADEN —
Pakistan's parliament voted on Friday not to join the Saudi-led military
intervention in Yemen, dashing Riyadh's hopes for powerful support from outside
of the region in its fight to halt Iranian-allied Houthi rebels.
Saudi Arabia had asked fellow Sunni-majority Pakistan to provide
ships, aircraft and troops for the campaign, now in its third week, to stem the
influence of Shi'ite Iran in what appears to be proxy war between the Gulf's
two dominant powers.
While Saudi Arabia has the support of its Sunni Gulf Arab
neighbours, Pakistan's parliament voted against becoming militarily involved.
"(Parliament) desires that Pakistan should maintain
neutrality in the Yemen conflict so as to be able to play a proactive
diplomatic role to end the crisis," it said.
Saudi Arabia played down the decision, saying it was not yet a
final move because "the Pakistani government has not announced an official
position up till now," coalition spokesman Brigadier General Ahmed Asseri
told reporters on Friday.
"The presence of our Pakistani brothers would be an
addition, but the lack of their ground, naval or air deployment will not affect
the operations of the coalition," he added.
The Saudi-led alliance began air strikes in Yemen against the
Houthis on March 26 after the rebels, who already control the capital, began a
rapid advance towards the southern port city of Aden.
Saudi Arabia is concerned that the violence could spill over the
border it shares with Yemen, and is also worried about the influence of Shi'ite
Iran, which has denied Saudi allegations it has provided direct military
support to the Houthis.
Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has called the
Saudi's involvement in Yemen "genocide," raising tensions between the
regional powers as fighting on the ground in Yemen threatens all-out sectarian
war.
A suicide car bomb detonated outside a security building used by
Houthi militiamen in central Yemen on Friday, killing at least 20 people,
residents and a local official said.
The local branch of the global Sunni militant group Al Qaeda
claimed the attack in the city of Bayhan in Shabwa province, which has witnessed
heavy fighting between the Shi'ite Houthi fighters and local militiamen who
have been supported by days of Saudi-led air strikes.
Residents said dozens were injured in the huge blast, including
several civilians, in the first car bombing since fighting in Yemen rapidly
escalated last month.
FIRST INTERNATIONAL AID FLIGHTS
Coalition air strikes hit Yemen for a sixteenth straight day. In
Sanaa, they targeted weapons storage sites used by soldiers loyal to former
president Ali Abdullah Saleh, a powerful supporter of the Houthis.
The air raids, which hit the Defence Ministry and other
facilities, lasted for hours, residents told Reuters. "The sky was lit
up," said Fadel Muhammad. "We heard big explosions."
Saleh is still influential in the military, despite giving up
power in 2012 after mass protests against his rule, complicating efforts to
stabilise the country.
Troops loyal to him are backing Houthi forces fighting his
successor President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi, a former general seen by the
Houthis as a pawn of Sunni Gulf Arab monarchies and the West. Hadi has fled to
Saudi Arabia.
Yemen's 150,000 barrel-per-day Aden refinery has shut as the
conflict worsened, industry sources said. The refinery earlier suspended its
tender process for importing oil products, due to the crisis and several
tankers headed to the country have been diverted away.
Aden residents said electricity and water had been cut off in
several districts, rubbish had been left uncollected and hospitals were unable
to cope with the number of wounded.
Fishermen from villages around an hour's drive west of the stricken
city said dozens of families in the last two days have taken to the Arabian Sea
on rented boats to seek safety in Djibouti in East Africa.
"The humanitarian situation in Aden is catastrophic and
disastrous, both in terms of the rising number of killed and injured as well as
in declining capabilities of medics, along with shortages in water and
electricity," local health ministry official Al-Khadr Lawsar said.
"We call on fighters to adhere to international law and
respect the work of ambulances and medical staff in the field," he added,
citing the fatal shooting of two brothers working for the Red Crescent while
evacuating wounded last week.
Aden residents reported heavy explosions from coalition air
strikes and naval bombardment on Houthi positions which shook windows
throughout the city.
An Indian ship captain working in Aden was killed in shelling on
the city’s dockyard overnight, his company announced, and local media reported
that Houthi and allied army units had fired mortars into the area.
An air strike hit a local government compound in the northern
suburb of Dar Saad and fires in Aden's outskirts sent plumes of smoke into the
air.
Two planes carrying emergency medical aid landed in Sanaa on
Friday, the first deliveries from international aid groups since the heavy
fighting began.
They were brought in by the International Committee of the Red
Cross and the United Nations Children's Fund, UNICEF, which had been trying for
days to get aid flights into the country.
(Additional
reporting by Amjad Ali in Islamabad, Ali Abdelaty and Mohammed Ghobari in Cairo
and Dominic Evans and Noah Browning in Dubai; Writing by Michael Georgy;
Editing by Tom Heneghan)
