Islah militants carry out large campaign of arrests in Shabwa

SHABWA, Feb. 22 (YPA) – Islah Party militants carried out a massive campaign of raids and arrests, in search of armed elements affiliated to the Southern Transitional Council, funded by the Emirates, in Shabwa province, southeast of Yemen.

Local sources said that gunmen from Islah party, on board armored vehicles and military crews, stormed the villages of citizens, in Jardan district, under the pretext of searching for what they called “saboteurs.”

The sources confirmed that the raid campaign, accompanied by heavy gunfire in the villages of the citizens, created terror among the women and children of the area.

The sources said that Islah gunmen arrested a number of citizens and children, including one of the elderly people who were over 80 years old, demanding that the people hand over gunmen in the “Shabwani Elite”, which belongs to the Southern Transitional.

During the past two days, Islah militants launched a massive campaign of arrests of those loyal to the transitional movement, in the name of restoring government buildings, in the city of Ataq, the capital of Shabwa.