SANAA, Yemen — Clinging to power despite weeks of protests, Yemen's president scrapped an offer Sunday to step down by year's end, and Islamic militants taking advantage of the deteriorating security took control of another southern town. Opponents of President Ali Abdullah Saleh — a group that started with university students and has expanded to include defecting military commanders, politicians, diplomats and even Saleh's own tribe — had immediately rejected his offer a week ago to leave by the end of this year. The formal withdrawal of the offer by the president indicates that an attempt by both sides to negotiate a transfer of power to end the crisis has failed.
In a sign of what is at stake in Yemen if security further unwinds, Islamic militants seized control of a small weapons factory, a strategic mountain and a nearby town in the southern province of Abyan, said a witness and security officials. A day earlier, militants believed to belong to Yemen's active al Qaeda offshoot swept into Jaar, another small town in the area.
In both cases, the militants met no resistance because police had withdrawn weeks earlier — as they did in several other parts of the country — in the face of challenges by anti-government protesters.
Saleh is a key ally of the United States in battling al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, which the Obama administration considers the top terrorist threat to the U.S.
Washington is concerned that the cooperation could be imperiled if Saleh departs, and U.S. diplomats sat in on the political talks last week that failed to make progress on a transfer of power.
