SANAA - Over 70 followers of a slain rebel preacher were killed and the army suffered dozens of casualties in two days of fierce clashes in northwest Yemen that ended with the army taking control of rebel positions, tribal sources said Friday.
"More than 70 followers of (Sheikh Hussein Badr Eddin al-Huthi) were killed in the fighting which went on throughout Wednesday and until Thursday night" in Saada province, where the two sides have been locked in fighting since March 28, one source told AFP, requesting anonymity.
"Dozens of troops were killed or wounded, particularly when counter-terrorism units parachuted onto mountain tops overlooking the rebels` strongholds in Razamat and Wadi Nushur (Nushur Valley) on Thursday," the source said.
The sources said government forces stormed rebel positions in Razamat, Wadi Nushur and Al-Shafia, wresting control of the outposts Thursday night.
"Troops are combing the area to hunt down the leaders of the rebellion, starting with Badr Eddin al-Huthi," father of the preacher killed by the army last year and who authorities say is the rebels` spiritual leader, according to the tribal source.
Government forces are also trying to track down the ground commanders of the rebels from the Faithful Youth movement, chiefly Abdullah Ayedh al-Razami, Yussef al-Madani and the preacher`s brother Abdul Malak, they said.
Pro-government tribal sources said dozens of militants have been rounded up, mostly young men aged 18 to 22.
Hussein al-Huthi, a radical preacher from the minority Zaidi community, was killed by the army last September, nearly three months after he started a rebellion in the mountainous northwest.
The uprising, near the border with Saudi Arabia, triggered clashes which left more than 400 people dead.
The Zaidis are a moderate Shiite Muslim sect dominant in northwest Yemen but in the minority in the mainly Sunni country.
04/08/2005 06:52 GMT