DUBAI, April 8, (Agencies): Bahrain’s crown prince said he was committed to reform but warned there would be “no leniency” for those who tried to divide the kingdom, where weeks of protests were quashed by a fierce security crackdown. Sheikh Salman bin Hamad al-Khalifa, seen as a moderate reformer in the royal family, said on Bahraini television Thursday night the Gulf island kingdom was committed to reform but said the unrest following weeks of demonstrations had escalated to the point that security forces had to step in. “In this significant moment in the development of our country, I will continue ... to be firm on the principle that there can be no leniency with anyone who seeks to split our society into two halves,” he said.

In March, Bahrain’s Sunni rulers announced martial law, deployed security forces and called in troops from neighbouring Sunni-led Gulf Arab countries, including Saudi Arabia, to break up pro-democracy protests led mostly by Shiites. The move stunned the majority Shiites population and angered non-Arab Shiites power Iran, just across Gulf waters. Since the crackdown, members of leading Shiites opposition group Wefaq and many Shiites residents have complained of dozens of disappearances at checkpoints which have been set up around capital Manama and are manned by forces in balaclava face masks.

They say hundreds of people, including politicians, activists and doctors sympathetic to protests, were arrested and several hundred workers, mostly Shiites, have been sacked.
Analysts and political sources say Sheikh Salman lost a battle with hardliners in his own family to try to take time to launch talks with the opposition instead of using military force, and that hardliners from both the ruling family and the opposition have now drowned out more moderate voices.
In his Thursday speech, the crown prince said he was still committed to reform.
“I will not spare any effort to in participating ... to the progress of this reform.”
Shiites, who make up at least 60 percent of the population, have long complained of discrimination when competing for jobs and services. They are demanding better representation and a constitutional monarchy, but radicals calling for an overthrow of the monarchy alarmed the Sunni minority.
On Friday, Human Rights Watch denounced what it called arbitrary detentions and said freed detainees interviewed reported incidents of beatings and abuse. The US-based rights group called on the government to report and give a reason for all detentions.

“Emergency Law does not provide authorities a free hand to trample basic human rights,” said Joe Stork, the deputy Middle East director of Human Rights Watch.
“Bahrain has created a state of fear, not a state of safety.”
An international humanitarian organization said Thursday that Bahraini authorities turned hospitals into “places to be feared” during a deadly crackdown on anti-government protesters in the Gulf country.
Doctors Without Borders condemned the arrest of injured opposition supporters being treated at medical facilities. In a statement, the organization said Bahrain’s security forces used hospitals and health centers as “bait to identify and arrest those (protesters) who dare seek treatment.”

Saudi
Hundreds of Saudi Shiites protested in the kingdom’s oil-producing east on Friday seeking the withdrawal of Saudi troops from neighbouring Bahrain and political rights and freedoms at home, demonstrators said.
The peaceful protests, with riot police nowhere to be seen, were held in the main Shiites Muslim centre of Qatif, where demonstrators, some of them women, waved Bahraini as well as Saudi flags. Others gathered in the nearby village of Awamiya.
Banners read “respect the rights to demonstrate” and “freedom of expression and opinion.”
Saudi Arabia sent 1,000 troops to Bahrain, a Sunni Muslim monarchy, to help contain pro-democracy protests led by that Gulf Arab country’s Shiites majority.
Saudi Shiites complain of discrimination, saying they often struggle to get senior government jobs and benefits available to other citizens. The government of Saudi Arabia, a monarchy that usually does not tolerate public dissent, denies such charges.
The world’s No.1 oil producer and a US ally, Saudi Arabia has escaped the kind of mass uprisings that have rocked the Arab world this year, but some protests have occurred in the Eastern Province, where most of the kingdom’s oil fields are.
Almost no Saudis in major cities answered a Facebook call for protest on March 11, in the face of a massive security presence around the country.
Dozens of Saudi men gathered outside the Interior Ministry in the capital in March to demand the release of jailed relatives.
King Abdullah last month offered $93 billion in handouts and boosted his security and religious police forces but did not make concessions on political rights.

Yemen
Embattled President Ali Abdullah Saleh rejected an exit plan by Gulf states trying to broker an end to bloody unrest, as tens of thousands of Yemenis massed on Friday for pro- and anti-regime protests.
“Our power comes from the power of our great people, not from Qatar, not from anyone else. This is blatant interference in Yemeni affairs,” Saleh told a massive crowd of regime supporters in Sanaa.
“We were born free, and we have free will, and they have to respect our wishes. We reject any coup against democracy, the constitution and our freedom,” he said.
His speech came a day after Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Hamad bin Jassem al-Thani had said members of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) “hope to reach a deal with the Yemeni president to step down.”
It was delivered as tens of thousands of Yemenis turned out for rival protests in the capital, one supporting the veteran president and the other calling for his departure.
After weekly Muslim prayers, supporters in Tahrir (Liberty) Square chanted “with our souls, with our blood, we sacrifice for Ali Abdullah Saleh,” some of them carrying his picture.
“The people want Ali Abdullah Saleh,” they chanted, in a variation on the ubiquitous opposition slogan, “the people want to topple the regime.”
They then marched from Tahrir to Sabaeen Square, where Saleh delivered his speech.
A few kilometres (miles) away, anti-regime protesters massed at a square near Sanaa University, chanting “Go, Ali!”

Clashes were not reported at either demonstration.
The slogan of the anti-government gathering was “Day of Steadfastness,” while the pro-government rally was dubbed the “Day of Reconciliation.”
Saleh, a strategic ally in the US fight against Al-Qaeda, has been in power since 1978.
The GCC proposal to Saleh would have seen him hand power over to his deputy, while providing guarantees of protection to him and his family, the opposition said.
A diplomat in Sanaa confirmed the content of the proposal, adding that it includes forming a national unity government led by the opposition.
The offer resembles one the opposition itself made at the weekend calling for Saleh to make way for Vice President Abdrabuh Mansur Hadi to head a caretaker regime.
The United States halted a record aid deal for Yemen in February amid growing unrest, marking a sharp about-face in US policy toward the anti-terror ally, The Wall Street Journal reported Friday.
Unnamed US officials told the Journal the latest package potentially worth $1 billion or more was an attempt to get fluctuating US-Yemen counterterrorism cooperation back on track.

Syria
At least 22 protesters were killed on Friday as anti-regime demonstrations and clashes with security forces raged around Syria, the head of the National Organisation for Human Rights said.
“We have the names of 17 demonstrators killed in Daraa, and we have been told of the deaths of two protesters in Homs and three in Harasta,” Qurabi told AFP by telephone from Cairo, where he lives in exile.
“We are aware that live bullets, tear gas and another gas that causes fainting were used,” he added.
Qurabi’s report was more or less in line with other activists, who earlier said 13 protesters had been killed in the flashpoint southern town of Daraa, a number of people wounded in the central industrial city of Homs and also spoke of fighting in Harasta.

The official SANA news agency said 19 members of the security forces were killed and 75 were wounded by “armed groups” in Daraa.
“According to an interior ministry source, there were 19 martyrs among the police and security forces and 75 wounded by armed groups which used live ammunition in Daraa,” the agency said.
Amnesty International said it had confirmed eight people were killed in protests on Friday, six in Daraa and two in Homs in the west.
“The alarming reports coming from Syria today show that the authorities have not altered their violent methods for dealing with dissent,” said Philip Luther, Amnesty’s Deputy Director of the Middle East and North Africa Programme.
An activist asking not to be named for security reasons told AFP the people in Daraa were killed when security forces opened fire with rubber bullets and live rounds to disperse stone-throwing protesters.

“Thousands of demonstrators leaving from three mosques marched to the courthouse but security forces dressed in civilian clothing fired tear gas to disperse them,” said the activist.
“Demonstrators threw stones and clashes ensued,” the activist said, adding that “the situation is very tense” in Daraa, some 100 kilometres (60 miles) south of Damascus.
Protesters angered by the deaths set fire to the ruling Baath party’s headquarters in Daraa, he added.
State television said “saboteurs and conspirators opened fire on residents and security forces” alike in the town, killing two people — an officer and an ambulance man.
State television broadcast footage showing young men in keffiyehs standing behind trees while the sound of automatic weapons fire could be heard.
The agricultural city of Daraa has been the focal point of anti-government protests marred by deadly violence that human rights activists blame on the security services and the government blames on “armed” groups.

President Bashar al-Assad, under popular pressure to introduce major political reforms and end emergency powers which give security services great leeway to crush dissent, had ordered a probe into previous protest casualties in Daraa.
Abdel Karim Rihawi, who heads the Syrian League for the Defence of Human rights, said several people were injured in clashes in the industrial city of Homs and that there had also been fighting in Harasta, north of the capital.
Rihawi also said several thousand people demonstrated in the port city of Banias and Tal, 20 kilometres north of Damascus.
The rallies, he said, were staged in solidarity with the “martyrs” of protests in Douma, Daraa and Latakia.
Thousands also marched in five towns in northern Syria, mainly in predominantly Kurdish Hassake and Ammuda, calling for an end to emergency rule and the release of prisoners, another rights activist said.
“More than 3,000 people, Kurds, Arabs and Assyrians (Christians), demonstrated in Qamishli after Friday prayers before staging a sit-in on the main road,” Kurdish rights activist Radif Mustafa told AFP.

Libya
Libyan rebels said on Friday they had repelled an assault by government troops on the eastern flank of the coastal city of Misrata but the fighting had forced residents to flee the area.
A rebel spokesman said forces loyal to Muammar Gaddafi had advanced on the heavily populated Esqeer district in an effort to loosen the rebels’ grip on Misrata where families are crammed together in the few remaining safe districts.

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said it expected a humanitarian vessel it had chartered to reach Misrata by midday on Saturday, but gave no details of the relief cargo it was carrying.
“The attack from the east has been repelled now and the (pro-Gaddafi) forces have been pushed back,” a rebel spokesman who gave his name as Hassan al-Misrati told Reuters by telephone.
Gaddafi’s armour also shelled areas around Misrata’s strategically important Tripoli road, which cuts through to the city centre from the western outskirts.
Earlier, rebels had barricaded parts of the main artery with containers full of sand and stones in an effort to isolate government snipers deployed on rooftops from back-up forces.
Residents say they and thousands of migrant workers trapped in Misrata face shortages of basic foodstuffs and have only sporadic water and electricity. Doctors in the past few days have said the hospitals are overwhelmed.

Accounts from Misrata cannot be independently verified because the Libyan authorities have not allowed journalists to report freely from the city.
The US government hit Libya’s prime minister and its oil and finance ministers with sanctions Friday, in a fresh bid to fracture Moamer Kadhafi’s inner circle.
The US Treasury Department said it had frozen the assets of five senior Kadhafi aides, including Shukri Ghanem, the head of the country’s powerful oil company.
It also targeted prime minister Baghdadi Mahmoud.
The US has frozen around $34 billion in Libyan assets since mid-February and has tried to use the unblocking of funds as a carrot for aides to defect.

“We will continue to expose and impose sanctions on senior Libyan government officials who choose to remain at Kadhafi’s side,” said US sanctions czar David Cohen.
“They have a choice to make, and we will make that choice as stark as possible.”
Earlier this month the US government lifted sanctions against former foreign minister Mussa Kussa after he defected to Britain.
On Friday the Treasury Department also placed sanctions on the Kadhafi International Charity and Development Foundation and the Waatasemu Charity Association, two organizations controlled by the Libyan leader and his children.
Some 19 individuals are now subjected to the measures.
NATO refused Friday to apologise for a deadly airstrike on Libyan rebel tanks and dismissed talk of a military stalemate, as the insurgents regrouped their scattered forces in the east.
British Rear Admiral Russell Harding, deputy commander of NATO’s Libya operations, said the military alliance had been unaware that the opposition was using tanks.

“It would appear that two of our strikes yesterday may have resulted in the deaths of a number of TNC forces who were operating main battle tanks,” he said, referring to the rebels’ Transitional National Council.
When asked if the alliance had apologised to the rebels, Harding told reporters: “I’m not apologising.”
“The situation on the ground, as I said, was extremely fluid and remains extremely fluid. Up until yesterday we had no information that the TNC or opposition forces were using tanks,” he said.
“Our role is to protect civilians. Tanks have been used in the past to directly target civilians,” Harding said in a video news conference from NATO’s Libya operations headquarters in Naples, Italy.
Britain’s Foreign Secretary William Hague insisted Friday that international allies would not deploy ground troops in Libya, even if a military stalemate drags on between Muammar Gaddafi’s forces and rebel fighters.

Hague told BBC radio that Britain would not consider deploying troops, or supplying weapons to the rebels, even if the country’s opposition continued to struggle to advance on Gaddafi’s strongholds in western Libya.
“There is going to be no ground invasion of Libya, that is forbidden by the United Nations resolution — it is not what the opposition want, and it is not what we want,” Hague said.
However he insisted that Gaddafi would be soon ousted.
“I think time is against the Gaddafi regime. There is no future for Libya now with the Gaddafi regime,” Hague said.
Hague canceled a planned visit to South America this week to lead Britain’s efforts on seeking an end to the conflict in Libya.
Alan Charlton, Britain’s ambassador to Brazil, said the trip had been pulled because Hague was “directing his focus on Libya” and preparing for the meeting of an international contact group in Doha next Wednesday.

Egypt
Tens of thousands of Egyptians massed in Cairo’s iconic Tahrir Square on Friday two months after president Hosni Mubarak was ousted, to demand that former regime officials including the veteran strongman be purged and tried.
Waving flags and holding banners in a protest dubbed the “Day of Trial and Cleansing,” protesters vowed to press the ruling military council to deliver on promises of reform and justice.
Regular rallies have been held since Mubarak was toppled on Feb 11, but the numbers were significantly higher this week because of the participation of the Muslim Brotherhood, the largest and most organised opposition movement.
“These corrupt people need to be tried,” said Fairuz al-Tayyeb, 27, a teaching assistant.
She said the military council that took power when Mubarak was ousted was stalling over promises for a free and democratic system.
“I don’t understand why they are so slow. I feel corruption is everywhere, even in the military. But now we know our way and we will keep coming back every Friday until the country is cleansed,” she said, as a military helicopter hovered overhead.
“There is still a delay in taking action against people who harmed the Egyptians. We are worried they can still do more damage,” said Sameh Ahmed, 35, a development adviser.
Hossam Bahgat, who heads the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights, said the protests had been successful.

“People are coming primarily to keep the momentum. The transition process has so far lacked predictability,” Bahgat said.
“The Friday protests have so far been effective in getting two or three concessions each time.”
Earlier, draped in Egyptian flags, Muslims were joined by Christians for weekly prayers during which Muslim cleric Safwat al-Higazi called for Mubarak to face criminal charges.
“We don’t only want to try him for the millions (of dollars) but also for the blood,” he told the crowd. “We want to try him just as he tried the people in state security courts, but we want a popular trial.”
Mubarak, his wife Suzanne and their two sons Alaa and Gamal and their wives have already been banned from travel and had their assets frozen.
Higazi said the “cleansing” had to go beyond the presidential palace, threatening to storm the state television building because regime elements were still there.
“The rotten smell of the regime emanates from under their masks. We are prepared to occupy this building and manage it to make a patriotic media,” he said.
Tahrir Square was the centre of massive nationwide protests that erupted on January 25 and lead to the ouster of Mubarak, who handed power to the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces.

Oman
Heavy security prevented fresh protests after Friday prayers in the Omani city of Sohar, where protesters camped out for over a month before security forces moved them out last week.
Checkpoints were set up across the northeastern industrial city with dozens of armoured vehicles blocking access to protest areas. Residents’ names were checked against a list and access to mosques was restricted, while a helicopter flew overhead, witnesses said.
Demonstrations in Oman, inspired by protests that have spread across the Middle East and toppled the leaders of Egypt and Tunisia, have focused on demands for better wages, jobs and an end to corruption. Many protesters have demanded the state prosecute sacked ministers for corruption.
“Worshippers have been restricted from going to Friday prayers because of so many checkpoints,” one resident said. Asked if there would be further protests in the area, he said: “I don’t think so.”
Another resident said: “There are at least a dozen checkpoints in Sohar, more than three times what there were last Friday.”
Omani activists using emails and text messages called for a a Friday demonstration against the killing of at least one and wounding of eight others when security forces crushed a crowd of stone-throwing protesters last week. Witnesses later said that between 50 and 60 protesters were detained last week.
Sultan Qaboos bin Said, who has ruled the once sleepy sultanate for 40 years, has embarked on a series of reforms since protests began.

Morocco
A youth-led protest movement in Morocco said on Friday it would boycott an invitation to present a constitutional review panel with its ideas for political reform, branding the exercise a sham.
The February 20 Movement said it would push ahead with weekly protests, including one on Friday in front of parliament, to demand King Mohammed cede his political powers, the dismissal of government and the dissolution of parliament.
The group has spearheaded some of the largest anti-government protests the North African state has witnessed for decades, unsettling a political elite desperate to prevent any spillover of popular revolts from Tunisia, Libya and Egypt.
“We refuse to be part of a pseudo-democratic process that seeks to give Moroccans half the reform they deserve,” Ahmed Mediany, a member from the group’s branch in Casablanca, Morocco’s biggest city, told Reuters.
Formed by the monarch, the review panel had invited members of the group from 40 cities nationwide to attend an April 16 meeting, part of consultations that also include political parties and the trade unions.

Protesters are demanding reforms that put democratic limits on the monarchy and say the king must curb his business and political clout and that of his inner circle.
They also want to see legal cases brought against officials and businessmen they accuse of abuse of power, public fund mismanagement and other malpractices.
In the course of their talks with the panel, coalition and opposition parties, as well as unionists, have demanded the king be stripped of the power to appoint the prime minister but are happy for him to retain control over foreign and defence policy.
That, the leading opposition Justice and Development Party says, could include chairing a council with powers to dissolve parliament, dismiss security and intelligence officials, declare a state of emergency and ratify international treaties.
Analysts however say political parties hold little sway in Morocco under a political system where the monarchy and the Makhzen — the secretive court elite — hold the real reins of power.