Houthis must end anti-government protests: UNSC

On Friday, the 15-member world body accused the Houthis of attempts “to obstruct the political transition."

“The Houthis and others continue to stoke the conflict in the north in an attempt to obstruct the political transition," said the Security Council.

The members also demanded that the Houthis pull out their fighters from the al-Jawf region “and remove the camps and dismantle the checkpoints they have erected in and around Sana’a."

"The Security Council calls on the Houthis to withdraw their forces from Amran.”

The world body has threatened to impose sanctions on anyone who endangers the stability of the Arab country.

Hundreds of thousands of the demonstrators have taken to the streets of the capital Sana’a, calling on the government to resign.

Yemen’s northwestern city of Amran, about 72 kilometers (45 miles) north of Sana’a, has also been under the Houthis’ control since early July.

Yemen’s Shia Houthi movement draws its name from the tribe of its founding leader Hussein Badreddin al-Houthi.

The Houthi movement played a key role in the popular revolution that forced former dictator Ali Abdullah Saleh to step down.

Saleh, who ruled Yemen for 33 years, stepped down in February 2012 under a US-backed power transfer deal in return for immunity, after a year of mass street demonstrations demanding his ouster.

HK