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Yemeni clashes claim lives
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Arab World
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By Agencies
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 Eye-witnesses say at least 15 people have been killed in fierce gun battles between Shia rebels and members of a tribe loyal to the government in the mountainous west of Yemen.
Thirteen people were also wounded in the clashes between the pro-government al Bukhtan tribe and the rebels, witnesses said on Sunday.
The clashes broke-out on Saturday in the Saada province near the border with Saudi Arabia, two months after Zaidi rebels killed an al-Bukhtan member who they accused of supporting the government.
Rebellion
Government forces have since joined the battle by shelling Zaidi rebel positions.
The on-off insurgency led by the Zaidi rebels against the Yemeni government has claimed thousands of lives since 2004.
Their aim is to re-instate the Zaidi Imamate that ruled northern Yemen until the 1962 revolution. The rebels reject the rule of Ali Abdullah Saleh, the Yemeni president, as illegitimate, although Saleh is himself a Zaidi.
Saleh has led Yemen since the unification of north and south in 1990. Before that he led North Yemen for 12 years.
An offshoot of Shia Islam, the Zaidis are a minority in mainly Sunni Yemen but form the majority in the northwest.
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