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SANAA: Three civilians were killed in crossfire during clashes between rival military units that rocked Yemen's capital for a fourth straight day Wednesday, medics said, as a day-old truce lay in tatters.
The violence came as tens of thousands of protesters flooded the streets of Sanaa for the funerals of 30 of the 76 people killed in the bloodiest days since mass anti-regime protests erupted in January.
Witnesses said the rival forces traded artillery rounds and bursts of automatic gunfire Wednesday morning in Eshrin street, opposite the residence of Vice President Abdrabuh Mansur Hadi, and the nearby Hael street.
The gunfire gained intensity after it began sporadically, while shells smashed into buildings where snipers had taken up positions, according to the witnesses.
“Nobody can help the victims due to the intensity of the fighting,” a resident there told AFP, adding that only soldiers and armed men were to be seen on the streets.
Residents remained holed up in their homes while businesses and banks in the neighbourhood were shut, witnesses said.
The clashes later spread towards Kentaky crossroad near the office of President Ali Abdullah Saleh's son Ahmed, where much of the fighting in the past three days has been focused.
Witnesses said several explosions rocked the area, without giving further details.
An initial toll was put at three civilians killed in the crossfire but there was no immediate indication of casualties among the soldiers.
“Three civilians were killed and 25 were wounded,” a medical official at a field hospital in Sanaa's Change Square, epicentre of the protests, told AFP.
Medics had earlier said at least 76 people, mostly unarmed protesters, died and hundreds were wounded in Sanaa between Sunday and Tuesday in clashes between dissident troops and those loyal to Saleh, during which security forces also used live fire to disperse crowds.
Republican Guard troops commanded by Ahmed had in the earlier skirmishes been shelling posts held by troops of the First Armoured Brigade loyal to dissident General Ali Mohsen al-Ahmar around Change Square, witnesses said.
Most of the casualties, however occurred when Saleh's forces fired on tens of thousands of protesters as they moved from Change Square, where they have been camped since February, further into the heart of the capital, according to witnesses and medics.
The fighting had receded on Tuesday night after the defence ministry said Hadi had given “strict orders for a rapid ceasefire in the capital and that government forces were obeying.”
An opposition official said the dissident troops had been observing a ceasefire since noon on Tuesday to “foil the plans of the band that wants a military escalation.”
It was not immediately clear what sparked Wednesday's resumption of hostilities, which comes amid warnings the impoverished Arabian Peninsula, buffeted by a rebellion in the north and a growing Al-Qaeda threat, is sliding towards collapse.
Further south in Yemen's second-largest city Taez, security forces and snipers on rooftops opened fire Wednesday on a demonstration of tens of thousands in the city centre using heavy machineguns, witnesses said.
Since Sunday, at least five protesters have been killed in Taez, according to medics.
On the diplomatic front, foreign officials speaking to AFP on condition of anonymity said a meeting between Hadi and UN and regional envoys was expected later Wednesday.
UN Yemen envoy Jamal Benomar and Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) chief Abdulatif al-Zayani arrived in Yemen Tuesday in the hopes of finalising agreements on the transfer of power from Saleh to his deputy.
Opposition forces have said however they would not negotiate while blood is running in the streets of the capital.
In Washington, State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said “the United States continues to support the Yemeni people's aspirations for a peaceful and orderly transition that is responsive to their aspirations for peace, reconciliation, prosperity and security.
Saleh, who has ruled Yemen since 1978, has been recovering in Saudi Arabia after a June 3 explosion at his presidential compound, but has so far refused to transfer power to his deputy or to sign the so-called Gulf Initiative.
The GCC plan, proposed last spring, calls on Saleh to step down and hand over all constitutional authorities to his deputy. In return, Saleh and his family would be granted immunity from prosecution.
