UPDATE 4-Violent protests across Yemen, 3 soldiers dead - Yahoo!

* 3 soldiers killed in province bordering Saudi Arabia

* Austrian oil firm OMV stops oil transports by trucks

* Protesters stab governor of oil, gas-producing Maareb

* Authorities deport 4 Westerners, 3 of them journalists

(Adds oil transports by trucks suspended in southern province)

SANAA, March 14 (Reuters) - Scattered clashes broke out

across Yemen on Monday, with three soldiers killed in the north,

as military forces were deployed to check nationwide protests

demanding the resignation of President Ali Abdullah Saleh.

The impoverished Arabian Peninsula state has been rocked by

weeks of demonstrations that have undermined Saleh's 32-year

grip on power, with both pro- and anti-government supporters

appearing to resort increasingly to violence in the struggle.

Seven demonstrators and three soldiers have died in clashes

since Saturday, raising the death toll from unrest above 30.

The United States, which has long seen Saleh as a bulwark

against a dynamic al Qaeda wing based in Yemen, has condemned

the bloodshed and backed the right for peaceful protest, but has

insisted only dialogue can end the political crisis.

Two soldiers and an officer were killed as clashes broke out

in the northern al-Jawf province, which borders oil giant Saudi

Arabia, Yemen's state news agency Saba said.

Fighting intensified after protesters stormed a municipal

building. Security forces fired on them, wounding 10, but could

not stop them seizing the building, a local official said.

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In the central Maarib province, where several oil and gas

fields of international companies are located, a man stabbed

governor Naji Zayedi, critically wounding him as he and police

tried to break up a crowd of thousands at a sit-in.

"Members of the opposition stabbed the governor and wounded

three others as security tried to stop protesters from inciting

chaos," a local official said.

OIL TRANSPORT BY TRUCKS SUSPENDED IN SOUTH

In the southern province of Shabwa, an official at Austrian

oil firm OMV said the company had suspended its

transports of crude by trucks from an oil field to the pumping

station of a pipeline because of the unrest.

"The suspension is temporary and due to the current security

instability," the official told Reuters, without saying how much

oil was carried by trucks and what portion of it was for export.

Yemen is a small oil producer pumping about 300,000 barrels

per day of crude.

As tensions in Yemen rose, three journalists and a

researcher from Britain and the United States were abruptly

deported on Monday. An airport official said they had all

entered on tourist visas and were not entitled to work there.

Saleh has made many verbal concessions to the protesters,

promising to step down in 2013 and offering a new constitution

giving more powers to parliament, but he has steadfastly refused

his critics' main demand that he leave office immediately.

Soldiers and armoured vehicles tried to cut off an area in

the capital, where around 20,000 have held a sit-in for weeks.

"We're expecting an attack at any minute, but we're not

leaving until the regime falls, " said protester Taha Qayed.

Crowds chanted: "Leave, leave you murderer."

Police fired in the air to try to break up tens of thousands

of protesters in Taiz, 200 km (125 miles) south of the capital

Sanaa. Three were hurt, but protesters continued demonstrating.

As demonstrations gather steam across the country, a string

of Saleh's allies have recently defected to the protesters, who

are frustrated by rampant corruption and soaring unemployment.

Some 40 percent of the population live on $2 a day or less in

Yemen, and a third face chronic hunger.

Activists said the former religious endowments minister of

Yemen, sacked a day earlier, joined protests in Sanaa on Monday.

"We call on all ministers and all noble people to resign and

join the revolution in Sanaa," leading activist Mohammed

al-Sharfi told Reuters.

Thousands were also protesting in al-Hawta, the regional

capital of southern Lahej province, residents said.

"Al-Hawta is in a state of paralysis. The opposition has

called for a general strike to protest at the repression of

demonstrators," a resident told Reuters by phone.

Popular revolts in Egypt and Tunisia have inspired this

latest wave of unrest in Yemen, but the country was already

seething with intermittent rebellions in the north and south.

(Additional reporting by Mohammed Mukhashaf in Aden;

Writing by Erika Solomon; Editing by Crispian Balmer)

via beta.sg.news.yahoo.com