Suspected Qaeda gunmen kill 6 Yemen troops in oil area

SANAA (Reuters) - Suspected al Qaeda gunmen killed six Yemeni soldiers in an eastern oil region Sunday, in the fourth assault since June on state targets blamed on the militant group's resurgent regional arm.

Al Qaeda in Yemen previously focused on high-impact strikes against Western and Saudi targets, but appears now to be targeting government forces in response to enhanced Yemen-U.S. security coordination and a government crackdown.

"Al Qaeda is believed to have been behind the attack on the soldiers' patrol," said a local official who asked not to be named. There were no reports of damage to energy installations in the small oil producer.

Fighting also flared up Sunday between a pro-government tribe and Shi'ite rebels, hours after the two sides agreed to a truce following battles last week which threatened to reignite a civil war.

Tribal leader Sheikh Saghir Ibn Aziz blamed the rebels, named Houthis after the clan name of their leaders, for the renewed fighting after clashes killed up to 70 people last week.

"The Houthis did not respect the agreement and attacked us. We responded," he told Reuters by telephone.

Al Arabiya television said the fighting, which killed four rebels, broke out after the tribesmen failed to withdraw from a position which the rebels said was part of the truce accords. There was no immediate comment by the rebels on their website.

Last week's fighting, in which government forces were also involved, was the bloodiest in the north since a truce in February ended a war between the state and the rebels that has raged intermittently since 2004 and last year drew in neighboring Saudi Arabia.

Yemen's President Ali Abdullah Saleh called Sunday for a permanent end to fighting in the north, especially in Saada province, the rebels' stronghold.

"Six wars are enough. Yes to security, stability and peace in Saada. No to the latest war," Saleh said in remarks carried by regional television stations.

Yemen's Western and Saudi allies want Sanaa, also trying to quell southern separatism, to resolve domestic conflicts such as the northern war so it can focus on fighting the resurgent regional arm of al Qaeda, seen as a bigger international threat.

Tension between the rebels and the Ibn Aziz tribe, from the same Zaidi sect of Shi'ite Islam but which sided with the state during the civil war, has been growing for months.

Qatar has offered to revive a 2008 peace deal it brokered between Sanaa and the rebels to end the war, which displaced 350,000 people; editing by Myra MacDonald.

(Reporting by Mohammed Ghobari; Writing by Cynthia Johnston and Firouz Sedarat; editing by Myra MacDonald)