By Mohammed Mukhashaf, Asma Alsharif

Reuters 
 

ADEN/JEDDAH: Bodies lay in the streets of a southern Yemeni town Wednesday as government forces battled Islamist militants, a local official said, underscoring the gravity of Yemen’s multiple conflicts.
President Ali Abdullah Saleh, 69, wounded Friday when rockets hit his palace, is being treated in the Saudi capital Riyadh but there were conflicting reports about his condition – ranging from fairly minor, to life-threatening 40-percent burns.

A truce between his forces and tribesmen who back pro-democracy protesters was holding in Sanaa.
Western and Arab powers have been working to persuade Saleh to stay away and allow a long-negotiated transition of power to begin.

Saleh has left a country in crisis, with Yemeni civilians bearing the brunt of fighting. Medical staff are having trouble reaching the wounded, and electricity and water are scarce, the International Committee of the Red Cross said.
Some 20 bodies have been retrieved in and around Sanaa since Saturday by ICRC and Yemen Red Crescent teams, including seven Tuesday in Al-Hassaba, north of the capital, the ICRC said.
“Because of the fighting, it has often been difficult for medical personnel to reach certain parts of Sanaa,” said Jean-Nicolas Marti, the head of the ICRC delegation in Yemen.

Sanaa was calm in Saleh’s absence, with a cease-fire holding between government forces and tribesmen loyal to Sheikh Sadeq al-Ahmar, head of the powerful Hashed tribal confederation, who have turned against the president.
Over 200 people have been killed and thousands have fled Sanaa in the last two weeks as fighting intensified.
Officials and residents described dire scenes in the southern Abyan Province where the army and Islamist militants have fought for days, causing thousands of residents to flee.

“There is a cat-and-mouse game going on in the streets now between the army and armed men. I can’t tell who’s who among them anymore,” said resident Khaled Abboud by telephone. “There is a smell of gunfire and blood in the air. I only stayed to protect my home, but now I want to get out of this hell.”
The fighting has reduced Zinjibar, once home to more than 50,000 people, to a ghost town without power or running water.

The Yemeni army said this week it had killed 30 militants in Zinjibar, while a local official said 15 soldiers had also died in battles for the town seized by gunmen nearly two weeks ago.
Some of Saleh’s opponents have accused the president of deliberately letting Al-Qaeda militants take over Zinjibar to demonstrate the security risks if he were to lose power.
There was still no clear word on Saleh’s health Wednesday.
“I visited him yesterday evening and he was good. He talked to us and asked about the Yemeni expatriates and he is better than the others who were injured,” said Taha al-Hemyari, head of Yemeni community affairs at the Yemeni Embassy in Riyadh.

A Saudi doctor familiar with Saleh’s case also said his burns were not as serious as some officials suggested, saying he may be able to leave Saudi Arabia in less than two weeks.
The Yemeni Embassy in Washington also said in a statement Saleh’s health was improving.
Previously, Yemeni and U.S. officials said Tuesday that Saleh was in a more serious condition with burns over roughly 40 percent of his body. Saudi newspaper Al-Watan cited a Yemeni diplomat Wednesday as saying another operation on Saleh was possible.

Forty percent burns would mean Saleh’s life could be in danger: “Somebody of that age, with that percentage of burns, has got a pretty poor prognosis, especially if these are full thickness burns,” said Brendan Eley, chief executive of the Healing Foundation at Britain’s Royal College of Surgeons.
Saudi officials say it is up to Saleh whether he returns home but they, and their Western allies, may want to revive a Gulf-brokered transition deal under which the Yemeni leader would quit in return for immunity from prosecution.