Police in the United Arab Emirates have thwarted an attempt to smuggle pistols to Yemen, where the popular uprising demanding the ouster of the regime is gaining further momentum.
Lieutenant General Dahi Khlafan, Dubai police chief, said the police arrested a network while trying to traffic the 16000 guns from Turkey to Yemen's Saada province, the stronghold of the Shiite Houthi Group with which the government reached a ceasefire earlier last year ending a six-year war in the far north.
The guns were trafficked inside a furniture container, he was quoted by UAE media outlets as saying on Thursday.
Six Arabs living in the United Arab Emirates were arrested, Khalfan said, declining to say to whom the weapons had been shipped specifically.
"However, the shipment was not planned to be received by the Yemeni government," he said.
I think the pistols were planned to be used for assassinations, said Khalfan, wondering: how could the people who are striving for bread arrange millions in USD to buy all these guns?
The shipment passed through Egypt and some GCC states before it was intercepted in Dubai.
Yemen has been hit by massive protests and month-long sit-ins calling for the departure of President Saleh after the wave of unrest following the Tunisian and Egypt revolts.
President Saleh, who has ruled the country for 33 years, has been offering unwelcome initiatives to address the current situation including the last one calling for holding presidential elections by the end of the year.
The opposition and the youth protesters have rejected all Saleh's offerings, saying they are determined to continue their protest until the government was ousted.