5 Protesters Shot Dead by Saleh Loyalists in Sanaa

Loyalists of Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh shot dead five people in Sanaa on Thursday who had been protesting against a power transfer deal that promises him immunity from prosecution, medics said.

The five were all killed by live rounds, said the medics at a field hospital set up protesters in the capital's Change Square, where they have been camped out since February.

Thirty-four others were wounded, the medics added.

An Agence France Presse correspondent said the protesters were met by gunfire from armed men in plain clothes whom they deride as Saleh's "thugs", as they marched towards the city center.

Activists who have spearheaded 10 months of protests against Saleh's rule had called for a mass rally to protest against the promises of immunity granted to him and his family under the agreement with the parliamentary opposition which the veteran president signed in Riyadh on Wednesday.

The protesters also chanted slogans against the Common Forum parliamentary opposition bloc led by the Islamist al-Islah (reform) party.

"Common Forum, Islah, leave after the assailant," they shouted, referring to Saleh, who is expected to go straight from the Saudi capital to New York for medical treatment.

After the attack, the marchers returned to Change Square as pro- and anti-Saleh gunmen deployed across the capital, sending tensions soaring, residents said.

In Yemen's second-largest city Taez, another center of the protests against Saleh's 33-year rule, "hundreds of thousands" took to the streets on Thursday with similar demands, organizers said.