Efforts to bring Yemen’s warring factions together to discuss their conflict have made some progress, officials said yesterday, as warplanes from a Saudi-led coalition mounted more air strikes against the dominant Houthi group.

Yemen’s dominant Houthi group yesterday accepted a five-day humanitarian ceasefire proposed by its adversary Saudi Arabia but said it would respond to any violations of the truce.

Suicide bombers in the Yemeni capital Sanaa blew themselves up during Friday prayers at two mosques used by supporters of Shi’ite rebels, killing 142 people and wounding 260 in the country’s deadliest militant attack in years.

Thousands of protesters have demonstrated across Yemen, some supporting the Shiite rebels who seized the capital and others demanding the country’s south secede after the nation’s president and cabinet resigned.

Shiite Houthi rebels have shelled the residence of the country’s president and also swept into the presidential palace in the capital, according to the country’s information minister.

Frustrated owners of trouble-ridden cars have often dreamed about destroying them, but Pourmohseni Hadi went a step further in letting out his anger by publicly executing his $160,000-plus BMW M6 in front of a crowd of stunned onlookers outside the Frankfurt Auto Show.

Scores of inmates, including terrorists, are still on the run after escaping from a crowded Indonesian jail that was still burning today after prisoners set fires and started a deadly riot.

Yemeni leaders led a sombre ceremony today to mark the country’s national day, scaling back celebrations a day after a suicide bombing killed nearly 100 soldiers during a rehearsal for a military parade.

At least 38 soldiers were killed and dozens of others injured when a suicide bomber blew himself up at a military parade drill in the Yemeni capital Sanaa today.

Al Qaida militants have staged a surprise attack on a Yemeni army base in the south, killing 20 soldiers and capturing 25 just hours after a US drone strike killed a senior figure in the terror network wanted in connection with the 2000 bombing of the USS Cole in Yemen.

Al-Qaida-linked militants staged a dawn attack on an army post in south Yemen today, setting off clashes which left 23 dead on both sides, Yemeni army officials said.

Yemeni government troops have killed more than 100 al Qaida fighters in the past two days in an offensive against militant hideouts in the country’s south, the interior ministry said.

Yemeni government forces regained control of a strategic gateway in the south today after intense three-day shelling of al Qaida hideouts in the area that left 43 militants dead, military and medical officials said.

Al Qaida militants overran an army base in southern Yemen today, capturing heavy weapons and turning them on soldiers in intense clashes that left 61 dead, a military official said.

A car bomb outside the gate of a presidential compound in a southern Yemeni city killed at least 25 people, a health official said, hours after the country’s new president was formally inaugurated and vowed to fight al-Qaida.

Abed Rabo Mansour Hadi has been sworn in as Yemen’s new president, replacing Ali Abdullah Saleh who ruled the country for 33 years before leaving office in a power transfer deal aimed at ending more than a year of political turmoil.

Tribesmen shot down a Yemeni government warplane which was bombing their positions north of the capital Sanaa today, military officials said.

At least 40 al-Qaida prisoners escaped from jail in Yemen today.

THE US made clear yesterday that it wants Yemen’s government to seize on the absence of President Ali Abdullah Saleh in a bid to effect a peaceful, orderly political transition.

Violence threatened a return to chaos in Yemen today with at least six people killed after a day of jubilation over the departure of President Ali Abdullah Saleh.

A suicide attacker ran onto a police training field and blew himself up, killing up to 10 policemen and wounding dozens of others today in northern Afghanistan, officials said.

The body of a well-known Shiite boxer was found in central Baghdad today near the dangerous street where he was kidnapped several days ago, police said.

Saddam Hussein’s former second-in-command, Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri, has been arrested in northern Iraq, an Iraqi defence ministry said today.

An obese woman and her eight-month-old foetus died of complications 18 months after a stomach-stapling operation – an apparent first that has prompted warnings about the risks of pregnancy soon after such surgery.

Three more of Saddam Hussein’s top officials have been captured in Iraq, the US army said today.

A top official from Saddam Hussein’s former regime, a man said to be a close confidant of the deposed Iraqi leader, has been captured in Baghdad

Hundreds of vendors have spread out across the Iraqi capital Baghdad to sell goods looted as Saddam Hussein’s regime collapsed.