Thousands of southern Yemenis rally for secession

Tens of thousands of southern Yemenis took to the streets across the southern port city of Aden Tuesday demanding that the formerly independent South secede as they celebrated the anniversary of the independence from British occupation Oct 14, 1963.

The anti-unity rallies come a day after the Yemeni president named a new prime minister in a bid to end a prolonged crisis gripping the country.

Bearing flags of the former People's Democratic Republic of Yemen, the pro-secession demonstrators gathered at a public square in the Khor Maksar district of Aden and across the main streets, and criticised the politics of the Sanaa-based government on the country's southern regions.

"Today we remember the Oct 14 Yemeni revolution, which ended the British occupation and at the same time we gear up to get our second independence from the northern forces," Ahmed Bader, a separatist activist in Aden, told Xinhua.

"A breakaway state is our main goal and we promise the southern people that victory is coming soon," Bader said.

Yemeni President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi Monday appointed Khaled Mahfoud Bahah, the country's envoy to the UN and former oil minister, as new prime minister.

Appointing Bahah came just a few days after Yemen's prime minister-designate Ahmed Awad bin Mubarak turned down the appointment for political reasons.

North and South Yemen unified peacefully in 1990, but their relationship deteriorated in 1994. Calls for separation were renewed in the country's southern regions in 2007.

The southerners have been complaining of being marginalised, particularly since they lost a four-month civil war in 1994.

Pro-secession protests are on the rise in the south amid a worsening economic situation and allegations of discrimination in favour of the northerners.

Concerns have grown since the conflict in southern Yemen is creating instability where the Yemen-based Al Qaeda offshoot could gain a foothold.