U.N. calls on Yemen to halt attacks on civilians (Reuters)

GENEVA (Reuters) ? The United Nations called on Yemen's government on Tuesday to halt deadly attacks on peaceful demonstrators, warning that civil war could erupt in one of the poorest Arab countries.

Hundreds of people have been killed and thousands injured in

unrest this year in Yemen, many due to the excessive use of force by security forces in a country mired in an "increasingly violent power struggle," it said.

The report by U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay called on Yemen's government to "take immediate action to end attacks against civilians and civilian targets by security forces," including their use of live ammunition on crowds.

A team of three U.N. human rights investigators, who carried out an assessment in Yemen from June 28 to July 6, saw tanks deployed in the southern city of Taiz and heavy shelling.

They called for a full international investigation backed by forensic and military experts who could examine all evidence.

Children have been subjected to killings, injury, suffocation from gas used on demonstrators, torture, arbitrary detention and recruitment by security forces, the report said.

Security forces had prevented wounded demonstrators from reaching hospital and in some cases have fired on ambulances.

The U.N. team called on armed tribal and other opposition groups to remove weapons from areas of peaceful demonstrations.

They cited allegations that the government had disrupted telecommunications, power and fuel supplies as a "form of collective punishment," while government officials blamed the opposition for having sabotaged an oil pipeline and power line.

"All sides may be guilty of using and abusing peaceful protesters and the civilian population in this increasingly violent power struggle," the 23-page U.N. report said.

Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh has authorised his vice president to sign a transition plan after a dialogue with the opposition, state news agency Saba said on Monday, a move that may hasten the end of Saleh's 33-year rule.

"Clearly the country was teetering on (the edge of) civil war," Hanny Megally, who led the U.N. team, told reporters.

(Editing by Tom Miles and Alastair Macdonald)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/un/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20110913/wl_nm/us_yemen_un

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