SANAA/ DUBAI: Embattled Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh vowed Tuesday that he will return soon to Yemen from Saudi Arabia, where he has been recuperating from wounds he suffered in an attack on his palace.
Speaking Tuesday in a televised address from Saudi Arabia, Saleh vowed to return home, telling his supporters: “See you soon in Sanaa.” He also lashed out at his opponents, calling them, “exploiters, war merchants, and street looters.”

He seemed to be in better shape compared to his first appearance in the beginning of July, after the attack, when he looked stiff and frail.
He said he is willing to hand over power to his vice president if the armed tribal fighters who support the protesters are pulled from the streets and the opposition ends its demonstrations.
Saleh belittled the parliamentary opposition as figures of “narrow interests and lack of thinking,” and accused them of “stealing” the slogans of young protesters who have been calling for his ouster in protests since late January.

Yemen is reeling from six months of mass street protests calling for Saleh’s ouster, and there are fears that his return to the country could spark a civil war. The political crisis already has triggered an armed conflict between Saleh’s forces and heavily armed tribesmen who have turned against him. There are also concerns that Yemen’s Al-Qaeda offshoot will take advantage of the turmoil and have a freer hand in plotting attacks on the West.
Saleh’s appearance followed comments published Monday from a member of Yemen’s ruling party that a prominent opposition tribal leader is the main suspect in Saleh’s assassination attempt.

“There is no longer room for doubt that Hamid al-Ahmar is the prime suspect in the sinful assassination attempt to which the president of the republic and a number of officials were subjected,” Sultan al-Barakani told the Saudi-owned pan-Arab daily Ash-Sharq al-Awsat Monday.

Meanwhile, fierce clashes Monday night between tribesmen and troops loyal to Saleh left 23 tribesmen dead, a source from the Bakil tribe said Tuesday, adding that the worst fighting was concentrated in the area of Sheheb Arhab.

The trouble began last week after the elite Republican Guard, led by Saleh’s son Ahmed, installed a checkpoint that allegedly harassed residents of the area.
Tribal sources claimed that the army was planning a war against the Bakil tribe, Yemen’s largest confederation of smaller tribes. But officials have claimed that gunmen belonging to opposition were plotting to take control of a nearby army base in addition to the Sanaa airport.