RIYADH/SANA'A/TEHRAN – Saudi Arabia on Friday denied being involved in a military offensive against Houthi fighters in Northern Yemen after Iran's president slammed the country over the issue. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad lashed out at Saudi Arabia for its violent military offensive against the civilians in northern Yemen. "Saudi Arabia was expected to mediate in Yemen's internal conflict as an older brother and restore peace to the Muslim states, rather than launching military strikes and pounding bombs on Muslim civilians in the north of Yemen," said Ahmadinejad while addressing the people of Ahvaz. The Saudi Foreign Minister Saud al-Faisal, however, denied any Saudi involvement whatsoever in military attacks against the Yemeni Shia fighters, known as the Houthis. "I don't know where he (Ahmadinejad) got this accusation ... that the kingdom is waging war on the Houthis," al-Faisal said in Riyadh. He added that even the Houthis don't say such a thing. "The real accusation is that Iran is the one that meddles in Yemen's internal affairs." Al-Faisal's remarks, however, quite categorically contradict the news reported nearly on a daily basis by Houthi fighters over the Saudi air offensive against the people of Yemen. Houthi fighters reported on Thursday that a man and two of his daughters, civilian all and sundry, were killed by Saudi fighter jets in northern Yemen. Riyadh joined Yemen's offensive against Houthis after accusing them of killing a Saudi border guard and occupying two border villages on November 3. Houthi fighters have denied the claims. Meanwhile, in another speech in the southern city of Hoveyzeh on Thursday, the Iranian chief executive drew an analogy between the September 11 attacks and the Holocaust, and described West's often-stated concerns over human rights, war on terror and democracy as an "explicit lie". "The Western states have always resorted to massacre of defenceless people, in order to infiltrate into special regions, under the pretext of the September 11 attack and Holocaust," the Iranian President remarked. In Sana'a, a Yemeni airstrike on two cars killed at least six suspected al-Qaeda insurgents in northern Yemen yesterday, a Yemeni security official said. "Two cars carrying eight dangerous al-Qaeda members were hit in an area between Saada and al-Jouf," the security official told reporters. "Two may have survived and escaped," he added. "The group included Qassem al-Remi, Ayed al-Shabwani, Ammar al-Waeli, and Saleh al-Teys," said the official, adding that the four are wanted by Yemeni and US security. The source confirmed Qassem al-Reni was killed: "He is the al-Qaeda military leader and senior planner of most operations in Yemen. "He escaped two previous airstrikes," he added. The source said another al-Qaeda insurgent, Ayed al-Shabwani, was killed in the same airstrike. Yemen had already intensified operations against al-Qaeda since a Yemen-based wing of the group said it was behind a failed December 25 attempt to blow up a Detroit-bound US airliner.
