By Yara Bayoumy and Mohammed Ghobari
SANAA, Jan 23 (Reuters) – Yemen drifted deeper into political limbo on Friday after President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi resigned in exasperation at a Houthi rebel takeover of the country, a move that appeared to catch the Iran-backed group off balance.
Hadi, a former general, blamed the Houthis’ control of the capital Sanaa for impeding his attempt to steer Yemen toward stability after years of turmoil and tribal unrest, deepening poverty and U.S. drone strikes on Islamist militants.
His resignation on Thursday startled the Arabian Peninsula country of 25 million, where the Houthis emerged as the dominant faction by seizing Sanaa in September and dictating terms to a humiliated Hadi, whom they had held as a virtual prisoner at his home residence clashes with security guards this week.
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The departure of Hadi, a southerner, has caused anger in Aden, where officials reacted by telling security officers to obey only orders issued in Aden, an implicit snub to institutions in the north, where Sanaa is.
Earlier in the week, Aden closed its docks briefly in protest against Houthi militia attacks on state institutions in Sanaa, calling them an “aggressive coup on the president personally and on the political process as a whole.”
Hadi’s decision marked an abrupt turnaround from Wednesday, when he said he was ready to accept Houthi demands for a bigger stake in constitutional and political arrangements. (Additional reporting by Mostafa Hashem in Cairo, Mohammed Mokhashaf in Aden and Doina Chiacu in Washington; writing by Sami Aboudi, editing by William Maclean and David Stamp)
