President Saleh pardons Socialist party leaders

Yemen's President Ali Abdullah Saleh yesterday issued a decision pardoning leaders of the Yemeni Socialist Party who led the coupe attempt in 1994, in order to re-establish a government in the southern part of Yemen just four years after the unification of the two parts of the country in 1990.

In a speech on the 13th anniversary for the unification of Yemen, Saleh called on the pardoned leaders to contribute into building the country "which has a room for every body," calling on those who live in exile to return back to Yemen. This amnesty, however, covers five southern leaders who were sentenced to death by the preliminary court in Sanaa in May 1997, including Salem al-Beid the former secretary of the Yemeni socialist party and deputy chairman of the presidential council which was formed after the unity and Haidar al-Attas the prime minister during the war.

Arab diplomats said that Saleh made telephone calls with Oman's Sultan Qaboos bin Said and with the President of the United Arab Emirates Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan in order to ensure the return back of Salem al-Beid and the former defense minister Haitham Qasem Taher if they decide to return back to Yemen. The two men had fled from Yemen following the war, the same as other 16 persons who were sentenced to imprisonment.

Death sentences in absentia were issued against al-Beid, al-Attas, Taher, Saleh Mansour al-Seyalli the former governor of Aden; Saleh Obeid Ahmad the deputy premier for defense and security affairs. All of them are in an optional exile distributed between Oman and the UAE. Other split persons will benefit from the amnesty decision, most of them are members of the Yemeni Socialist Party which ruled Yemen for almost 20 years.