Yemeni president to return home within days
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Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh will return home within days after finishing medical test in Saudi Arabia, an official of the ruling party said Sunday.
The remarks were made after rumors spread that Saleh had fled the country and would not return, a day after he arrived in Riyadh to receive treatment for injuries sustained in an attack on his presidential palace, which the Defense Ministry blamed on the al- Qaida wing.
"The president will return home after he finished his medical treatment within days to complete his constitutional term as president of the Republic of Yemen until 2013," the official, a close aide to Saleh, told Xinhua on condition of anonymity.
It was also confirmed by the ruling party's spokesman Tarik al- Shami.
Saleh and a number of high-ranking government officials were injured in the shelling hitting Saleh's palace on Friday, in which 11 of Saleh's guards were killed.
Meanwhile, Yemeni Vice President Abdu Rabu Mansour Hadi on Sunday formally started to exercise power as the acting president after Saleh left late Saturday for Riyadh, a senior official told Xinhua.
Hadi held a meeting later Sunday with the highest military council, which was attended by commanders from the family of Saleh, according to the official who asked not to be named.
Hadi then met with the U.S. ambassador to Yemen Gerald Feierstein and discussed the latest developments in Yemen, according to the defense ministry, which denied any discussion between the pair about procedures for the transfer of power after Saleh left Yemen.
Another Yemeni official familiar with the situation told Xinhua that during his meeting with Feierstein, Hadi received a phone call from a senior official of the White House, who has been closely following up the political developments in Yemen during the absence of President Saleh.
According to a close aide the president, Saleh hesitated to go to Riyadh Saturday night when Saudi doctors, who arrived in Sanaa to perform medical test for his injuries, told him that he must undergo a surgery in Riyadh.
"Saleh's hesitation came for fears that he could not return home as the president, but the Saudi King Abdullah bin Abdul-Aziz called him and assured him that he will be under the protection of (the King's) special guards," the aide told Xinhua on condition of anonymity.
The power supply in all Yemeni provinces, including the capital Sanaa, has recovered since early Sunday after long-time blackouts following pitched street battles in downtown Sanaa between the government forces and armed men loyal to opposition tribal leader Sadiq al-Ahmar.
Tens of thousands of anti-government protesters went to streets Sunday in several major provinces to celebrate Saleh's departure.
The opposition Joint Minting Parties (JMP) said Sunday that they were working with U.S. and Gulf leaders to prevent the return of the embattled president.
"We are working with U.S. and Gulf Arab leaders to prevent Saleh from returning Yemen again ... Saleh's rule and regime are over," the opposition spokesman Mohamed Qahtan told Xinhua.
He declined to elaborate further, but said he learned that Saleh had entered the operation room in a military hospital in Riyadh to remove a shrapnel from his chest.
He also said the opposition leaders were in a close meeting now to consider the situation after Saleh.
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