A week has gone by without news of Muhammad Al Maqalih, the editor of the opposition Socialist Party’s news website, Al Eshteraki, who was kidnapped by five masked gunmen while returning to his home in Sanaa on the evening of 18 September. Maqalih is an outspoken critic of President Ali Abdullah Saleh’s government.

“We are very concerned about this journalist, who is well known for criticising the government,” Reporters Without Borders said. “The authorities are pursuing their campaign of intimidation and repression against the Yemeni media.”

The week before his abduction, Maqalih posted an article on the Al Eshteraki website condemning a Yemeni military airstrike on fleeing civilians in the northern Sa’ada region, where fierce fighting is taking place between government forces and Zaydi separatist rebels. The toll from the airstrike was put at 87 civilians killed and more than 100 others wounded.

Local human rights groups have accused the Yemeni authorities of responsibility for Maqalih’s abduction. The government has been carrying out a major military operation in the north of the country for the past month in a bid to suppress the rebellion.

Journalists demonstrated yesterday outside the presidential palace in Sanaa in protest against Maqalih’s abduction.