Region

CAIRO/ADEN — Saudi-led air strikes hit the rebel-held Yemeni capital Sanaa on Tuesday hours before a five-day humanitarian truce was set to begin, and Washington cautioned against "provocative actions" after Iran dispatched a cargo ship to Yemen.

The United States said it was tracking Iranian warships accompanying the vessel bound for the port of Hodaida, and urged Iran instead to use a UN distribution hub in Djibouti to provide help to people in the war-damaged Arabian Peninsula country.

"We're certainly tracking this convoy closely," US State Department spokesman Jeff Rathke told a daily briefing. "We would discourage any provocative actions."

Iran is an ally of the Houthi movement, Yemen's most powerful political faction which is under attack by a Saudi-led coalition which accuses the group of toppling the country's rightful government.

Iranian warships will escort the vessel, a naval commander was quoted as saying by state news agency IRNA.

"The 34th fleet, which is currently in the Gulf of Aden, has special responsibility to protect the Iranian humanitarian aid ship," Admiral Hossein Azad said, referring to a destroyer and support vessel in international waters off Yemen.

In the latest violence, warplanes bombed targets in the northern province of Hajja near the border with Saudi Arabia, killing 20 people, most of them civilians, residents said.

Looking to prepare for the truce and jumpstart stalled political talks among Yemen's civil war factions, the new UN envoy to the country arrived in Sanaa, saying fighting would not resolve a conflict that crosses ethnic and religious faultlines.

Proxy

"We are convinced there is no solution to Yemen's problem except through a dialogue, which must be Yemeni," the envoy, Mauritanian diplomat Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed, was quoted as saying by the local Saba news agency.

Seeking to restore exiled President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi, an alliance of Gulf Arab nations has since March 26 been bombing the Iranian-backed Houthi militia and allied army units that control much of Yemen.

Backed by Washington, top oil exporter Saudi Arabia worries that the Shiite Muslim Houthi rebels are a proxy for what they see as moves by arch-rival Iran to expand its sway in their backyard.

Saudi-led air strikes on a rocket base in Sanaa on Monday killed 90 people and wounded 300, a local official was quoted as telling Saba. If confirmed, the death toll would be among the highest in a single bombing incident throughout Yemen’s war.

Sanaa residents said there were three air strikes on a base for army contingents aligned with the Houthis in the north of the capital on Tuesday, sending up a column of smoke.

The ceasefire was set to take effect at 11pm (2000 GMT) to allow the shipment of food and medicine to the country, which aid groups warn faces a humanitarian catastrophe.

Saudi Foreign Minister Adel Al Jubeir was quoted as saying on Monday that the truce in Yemen may be extended if “[aid deliveries] succeeded and if the Houthis and their allies don’t engage in hostile activities”.

Airlift

Adrian Edwards, a spokesman for UN refugee agency UNHCR, said planes were poised to take off from Dubai in the United Arab Emirates bearing 300 tonnes of sleeping mats, blankets and tent material.

“The UNHCR is making final preparations for a huge airlift of humanitarian aid into Yemen’s Sanaa, to take place over the next days if today’s proposed ceasefire comes into effect and holds,” he told a briefing in Geneva.

As the ceasefire neared, witnesses said the Saudi-led alliance bombed Houthi positions in the southern port of Aden, where local armed groups were still fighting the rebels.

Locals said four Aden residents were killed in Houthi shelling, while four anti-Houthi militiamen operating a tank were killed in an Arab air strike — one of the first reported incidents of friendly fire since the campaign began.

On Monday, the Houthis and Saudi forces exchanged heavy artillery fire along the two countries’ rugged desert border.

As of Wednesday, the UN agency OCHA said 1,527 people have died in the conflict, among them 646 civilians, and 6,266 have been wounded.

BAGHDAD — Attacks on Shiite pilgrims commemorating the birth of the Imam Ali killed at least 19 people and wounded more than 50 across the Iraqi capital, police officials said.

The largest of the attacks happened in central Baghdad when a suicide bomber attacked pilgrims buying food and drinks on their way back from the shrine of the Imam Ali, located in the capital's Kazimiyah neighborhood. Officials said at least 10 people were killed in the attack and another 25 wounded.

In eastern Baghdad, another two pilgrims were killed and nine wounded when a roadside bomb exploded on Palestine Street. On the northeastern edge of the capital, in the town of Bab Al Sham, at least three mortars targeted Shiite pilgrims, killing four and wounding at least 12.

Also in Mashahidah, just north of Baghdad, at least three pilgrims were killed and eight wounded by an improvised explosive device.

Hospital officials confirmed the casualties. All officials spoke anonymously because they are not authorised to brief the media.

No one has claimed responsibility for the attacks on the pilgrims, but the Islamic State militant group has been behind attacks in several of the capital's predominantly Shiite neighborhoods.

RIYADH/DUBAI — The new generation of Gulf Arab leaders meeting US President Barack Obama on Wednesday appear more assertive than their fathers, want a range of alliances instead of dependence on Washington, and may be readier to say “no” to their main ally.

Saudi Arabia's King Salman, 79, caused a stir this week when he said he would send his two heirs to the United States for the summit instead, raising fears about Gulf anger over US policy and reluctance to bless its plans for an Iran nuclear deal.

Kuwait's 85-year-old emir is the only member of the old guard of Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) leaders attending Camp David, although Qatar's emir, who has ruled for less than two years, will also be there.

The four others are sending younger deputies in part because older rulers are either too infirm to travel or may be too unconvinced by Obama's policies to see the visit as worthwhile, but their presence may still signify a shift to a new phase in US-Gulf ties.

The region's rulers were dismayed by Obama's perceived support for Arab Spring uprisings in 2011 and felt he had let them down by not pushing Israel harder to make peace, and by not bombing Syria after a poison gas attack in 2013.

"The trust gap remains with this administration. Will it deliver on its promises? It's not just the Saudis who feel this way — it's the Emirates, Qatar, Bahrain," said Mustafa Alani, an Iraqi security analyst close to Riyadh's interior ministry.

Educated in a world informed as much by modern media as traditional values, and in a region polarised along sectarian lines rather than those of the Cold War, the Gulf’s new leaders look subtly different from those that came before.

While Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Nayef, 55, and the UAE Crown Prince Sheikh Mohammed Bin Zayed Al Nahyan, 54, have been familiar figures to Washington policy makers for years, however, two others are less known.

The Saudi Deputy Crown Prince, Mohammed Bin Salman, 30, and Qatar’s Emir Sheikh Tamim Bin Hamad Al Thani, 34, are relative newcomers to the international scene whose approach to major international issues is still subject to debate.

Bahrain’s Crown Prince Salman Bin Hamad Bin Isa Al Khalifa, 45, is familiar to Western countries as a relative moderate in a ruling family where more traditional figures with hawkish views towards Iran and internal security still dominate.

Rising stars

Theodore Karasik, a Dubai-based geopolitical analyst, said it was important for Obama to spend time with young leaders who would wield influence for years to come, and who would be the interlocutors for his successor as president.

“It’s a reset of relations in advance of the re-entry of the Islamic Republic (of Iran) into the regional and international scene. Even if there are disagreements, this meeting will establish a new foundation of the Gulf-US relationship, in a new era,” he said.

Mohammed Bin Nayef, has worked closely with the US authorities as Saudi security chief to destroy an Al Qaeda network in the kingdom a decade ago.

Fast-tracked into the crown prince position last month, he will now succeed six of his uncles to become the first of Ibn Saud’s grandsons to rule Saudi Arabia, and is already in charge of security policy, and the prominent voice on political issues.

He is described by some diplomats in the region as having a mentor relationship to his young cousin Mohammed Bin Salman, the second-in-line to rule, who is both defence minister and in charge of economic and development policy in the kingdom.

The two cousins have been the public face of Saudi Arabia’s campaign in Yemen since it marshalled an Arab coalition for strikes against rebels allied to Iran on March 26, indicating to some that they favour a far more aggressive approach to Tehran.

By building a wide Muslim coalition — albeit one with few active members and logistically dependent on Western allies — the pair also signalled a shift towards expanding Riyadh’s security architecture to include regional powers.

Shared goals

The UAE’s Sheikh Mohammed, educated at Britain’s Sandhurst military academy, is seen as a close ally of Washington.

However, since taking over the day-to-day running of the UAE since his half-brother Sheikh Khalifa took ill, he has also worked to strengthen its regional role, sending troops to Afghanistan and warplanes on sorties in Syria, Libya and Yemen.

Sheikh Tamim of Qatar has also had considerable interaction with Western diplomats and leaders since before he took over from his father, Sheikh Hamad, who abdicated power two years ago. However, diplomats in the Gulf say it is still unclear what changes he will make from his father’s policies.

Under Sheikh Hamad, Qatar parlayed its immense natural gas revenue into a significant international role, rivalling Riyadh in regional diplomacy and aligning with the Muslim Brotherhood, much to its Gulf neighbours’ chagrin.

Sheikh Tamim has barely altered that path, but after a big row with Saudi Arabia and the UAE over its Islamist links last year, Qatar is now working closely with Riyadh to strengthen Syria’s opposition against President Bashar Assad.

That relationship, which combines the diplomatic and financial clout of Gulf states with the military power of Muslim Turkey to accomplish shared goals without relying on the United States, shows where many in the region think things are heading.

VIENNA — Iranian nuclear negotiator Abbas Araghchi said on Tuesday he was "very hopeful" that an accord on Tehran's nuclear programme could be reached with world powers ahead of the June 30 deadline.

"Different elements inside and outside of the negotiation chamber can prevent a deal but despite all of this, we will continue the negotiations and we are very hopeful that we can reach a deal before the deadline," he said at the start of a new round of talks in Vienna.

Negotiators in the Austrian capital were trying to reach a "single agreed text" and resolve any outstanding issues, he added.

Araghchi, who is Iran's deputy foreign minister, and his colleague Majid Takht are meeting European Union negotiator Helga Schmid behind closed doors at the Palais Cobourg.

Iran and the P5+1 powers — Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States plus Germany — want to turn a framework accord reached in Switzerland on April 2 into a full agreement by the end of June.

The deal is aimed at preventing Iran from developing nuclear weapons, in exchange for an easing of punishing economic sanctions imposed on Tehran since 2006.

A US delegation led by Undersecretary of State Wendy Sherman is due to join the Vienna talks on Wednesday. Political leaders of the remaining world powers involved in the negotiations will follow on Friday.

However, negotiations have been rendered more difficult after the US Senate passed legislation on May 8 giving Congress the right to review and perhaps even reject any nuclear deal between world powers and Iran.

Iranian officials said the vote was part of a "psychological war" against Tehran's negotiators.

DOHA — Qataris will have a rare chance to vote Wednesday as they choose candidates to sit on the country's only directly elected body, with calls growing to ensure more women are selected.

Only one woman was elected onto the 29-seat municipal council at the last vote and out of 118 candidates this time, only five are female, one fewer than the number who stood in the first such election 16 years ago.

Although the electorate of more than 23,000 people is split almost equally between men and women, the gender imbalance between the candidates is striking.

"It would be very disappointing if again only one female candidate won this time," said one of the hopefuls, Amal Issa Al Mohannadi.

Wednesday's vote is only the fifth time there have been direct elections in Qatar, with elections to the council taking place every four years, beginning in 1999.

Election fever is hardly sweeping the country, but in the streets of the capital Doha the candidates' posters are hung on hundreds of lampposts, alongside promises to improve services in their respective constituencies.

Wearing a niqab covering her face, Mohannadi added: "I am running for the second time despite all the challenges."

Mohannadi, a computer engineer who is studying for a PhD in public administration, said she is motivated this time because at the last vote she outpolled more than seven male rivals, but lost out to an eighth.

"I came second," she said. "If it were not for a tribal meeting in which they decided to vote for the male candidate, I would have been the winner. Without a quota for women, the challenge is huge."

Qatar, she added, is "a conservative society still inclined to vote in favour of the candidate son of the tribe and believes a male candidate is best able to deliver a voice, no matter if he is efficient or not".

'Need quota for women' 

Fatma Yusuf Al Ghazal, a retired school principal who is running for election for a second time, said the problem was not in getting women to stand, but the traditional way of voting along certain allegiances.

"There are no political barriers to run for the election," she said.

"On the contrary, the country encourages women to practice their political right, but the problem is in the tribalism and voting for the family.

"We need a law amendment to allow a quota for women," she said.

When the elections were first established, the Qatari authorities also set up a committee to look at ways to encourage women to vote and stand for election.

One woman who has broken new political ground in that time is Sheikha Jufairi, the only female candidate elected last time round who first won a seat on the council in 2003.

She has managed to hold onto it ever since, but plays down the role of gender.

"It's not a matter of male or female, it depends on one's efficiency and continuous contact with people," she said.

"I keep contacting people to encourage them to go to the polls and vote, it's a national duty."

Voting may be a "national duty" to Jufairi but poor turnout — last time it was a little over 43 per cent — suggest other Qataris do not share her view.

Voting is limited to Qataris aged 18 and over, even though locals make up just over 10 per cent of the population [around 280,000 people]. There have been some calls to increase turnout by extending the franchise, though Mohannadi says the vote should be kept to Qataris.

One reform that could increase voter participation is to give the council powers as it plays only an advisory role, making recommendations but having no legislative authority.

"The Municipal Council needs more executive powers," said Ghazal.

OCCUPIED JERUSALEM — Israel and Hamas share common interests, and the Palestinian Islamists must stay in power in the Gaza Strip to prevent the enclave descending into chaos, an Israeli general was quoted as saying on Tuesday.

Major-General Sami Turgeman, who as commander of Israel's forces outside Gaza had a leading role in last year's war with Hamas, cast the group in a pragmatic light in remarks reported in the top-selling Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth.

By doing so, he appeared to take a softer public line towards Hamas than Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has likened the movement to Daesh insurgents sweeping Syria, Iraq and elsewhere in the region.

Speaking to the heads of Israeli villages on the Gaza periphery on Monday, Turgeman said Hamas seeks stability and "does not want global jihad" — a term Israel uses to describe Daesh, Al Qaeda and their off-shoots.

"Israel and Hamas have shared interests, including in the current situation, which is quiet and calm and growth and prosperity," said the general.

With neither side apparently interested in renewed conflict for now, an Egyptian-brokered ceasefire that halted fighting in the 50-day conflict last July and August has largely held.

"There is no substitute for Hamas as sovereign in the Strip. The substitute is the IDF [Israel Defence Forces] and chaotic rule ... and then the security situation would be much more problematic," Turgeman said.

An Israeli military spokesman did not contest the accuracy of the quotes. Netanyahu's office had no immediate comment.

Without responding directly to Turgeman's remarks, Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri said the onus was on Israel to shore up the relative peace by easing its Gaza blockade and helping reconstruction.

"The ball is in the Israeli court," he said. "Hamas is willing to maintain the ceasefire because it is in the interest of our people in Gaza."

Turgeman predicted a continued build-up of Hamas's armed capabilities and renewed Gaza fighting "every few years".

"The alternative is to try to find periods of quiet, as much as possible," Turgeman said, arguing against rightist proposals that Israel, which withdrew from Gaza in 2005, retake the territory.

Hamas, which took power in Gaza in a brief civil war in 2007, preaches Israel's destruction and has fought three wars against it.

But Hamas has also voiced interest in a long-term truce with Israel and occasionally clamped down on Al Qaeda-aligned armed groups.

ANTALYA, Turkey — Preoccupied for more than a year by the Ukraine crisis, NATO foreign ministers meeting in Turkey this week will focus on instability on the alliance's southern flank, ranging from Daesh terror group in Iraq and Syria to turmoil in Libya.

By meeting in Turkey, which shares a 1,200km border with Iraq and Syria, NATO hopes to show it is responsive to the concerns of its southern members, as well as reinforcing eastern European allies worried by Russia's actions in Ukraine.

"Turkey is the only country which neighbours areas under Islamic State [Daesh]  control in Syria and Iraq," Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu told a news conference in the southern city of Antalya before the meetings on Wednesday and Thursday.

"This is not sustainable, and a big threat to Turkey. The summit will be an opportunity to share these views."

US Ambassador to NATO Douglas Lute described an "arc of instability" around the east and south of the alliance, with the "maybe failed state of Libya" a funnel for illegal immigration from states such as northern Nigeria, Mali, Niger and Somalia.

"You've got, to the east, to the southeast and to the south, pretty fundamental security challenges for NATO," he told reporters at a briefing late last week.

Libya has descended into lawlessness since rebels overthrew strongman Muammar Qadhafi in 2011 with the help of a NATO bombing campaign.

NATO as an organisation has not been highly active militarily in the south recently, although all of its member nations are part of the US-led coalition against Daesh. It also sent Patriot anti-missile systems to defend Turkey from possible attack from war-torn Syria.

The alliance is considering a request from Iraq for help training its army. But it says the security situation in Libya must improve before it could help train Libyan security forces.

EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini is expected to brief the NATO ministers on the EU's proposals for a military mission to capture and destroy smugglers' boats used to ferry migrants on perilous Mediterranean crossings from Libya.

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said NATO had not been asked to play a military role in the mission.

But Lute said information-sharing between NATO and the EU could be possible. Accurate intelligence pinpointing smugglers' vessels would be key to the success of the operation.

Ministers will discuss the situation in Ukraine and will also talk about whether NATO should keep a presence in Afghanistan after the current NATO-led training mission ends, probably at the end of 2016.

The most likely outcome is that NATO will then retain a small civilian-led mission, including both soldiers and civilians, a NATO source said.

Gaza City, Palestinian Territories — With Gaza's supply of drinking water expected to dry up by 2020, a Palestinian engineer is pioneering a machine to make seawater potable for residents of the coastal territory.

Diaa Abu Assi, a 29-year-old father-of-two, has spent much of his spare time in the past 18 months developing the system, which he hopes will be instrumental in saving lives in the besieged enclave.

"In five years, there will be no drinkable water in Gaza," Abu Assi says. "Water shortages are a real threat to life in Gaza. The only solution is to filter water from the Mediterranean."

Funded by Gaza's Islamic University — which is linked with the enclave's rulers Hamas — in cooperation with an Omani research organisation, the project uses nanotechnology to reduce the salinity in seawater to a drinkable level.

It pumps water at high speed through large iron pipes and filters made of nano-material to extract the saline. The water is then retreated with minerals that were removed during the desalination process.

The filter contains microscopic pores which are small enough to block the chlorine and sodium ions in seawater while allowing through the water molecules.

"The idea is to save Gaza from the disaster that awaits it in the next five years by using the one resource we do have — seawater," Abu Assi says.

Gaza, home to 1.8 million Palestinians, consumes 180 million cubic metres of water per year, half of which is used in agriculture and industry.

Gaza could be 'uninhabitable' 

The United Nations estimates that Gaza's population will grow by almost another 500,000 people in the next five years, which will push demand to an expected 260 million cubic metres of water annually.

Given Gaza's current water resources, the territory would become "uninhabitable", according to Robert Turner, director of operations in Gaza for the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA).

Gaza now depends on groundwater from its coastal aquifer for supplies, but the enclave's water authority says 97 per cent of its resources are polluted due to over-extraction and sewage contamination.

Abu Assi's machine can treat some 1,000 litres a day — a drop in the ocean for now, but he and his partner, fellow engineer Ala Al Hindi, say they will not stop there.

Hindi says they are seeking $300 million (274 million euros) to build a water treatment plant that has a much greater capacity.

But given the reality in Gaza, the two have struggled to raise funds.

"There's always a fear that projects will be destroyed in the next Israeli bombardment," Hindi says.

During last summer's 50-day war with Israel — which claimed 2,200 Palestinian lives and 73 on the Israeli side — Gaza's sole power station was hit, causing hours-long blackouts.

Abu Assi and Hindi have asked the Palestinian government based in Ramallah for assistance, but have had no response.

Local officials have no doubt of the need for a sustainable water supply.

'Alternative sources' needed

Munzer Shublaq, a water authority official in Gaza, said it was essential to "find alternative sources and stop pumping from the aquifer".

To meet current needs, authorities are having to pump four times the amount of water from the aquifer than is acceptable, Shublaq said.

The UN has warned the aquifer could become unusable as early as next year.

"With no perennial streams and low rainfall, Gaza relies almost completely on the underlying coastal aquifer," an UNRWA report from 2012 said.

"As groundwater levels subsequently decline, seawater infiltrates from the nearby Mediterranean Sea."

Pollution of drinking water is "compounded by contamination of the aquifer by nitrates from uncontrolled sewage, and fertilisers from irrigation of farmlands", it said.

The World Health Organisation has warned of the danger, noting that diarrhoea among children is on the rise.

Abu Assi hopes his project can help before it's too late.

"The lives of nearly two million people are at stake," he says.

BEIRUT — Syrian government helicopters dropped a barrel bomb Tuesday in a neighbourhood in the northern city of Aleppo, hitting a busy bus depot and killing at least 15 people, activists said.

The attack on the Jisr Al Haj neighbourhood killed at least 15 people, said the Local Coordination Committees, a monitoring group. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said at least 20 people were killed and 30 were wounded, including women and children.

Both groups are based outside Syria but rely on a network of activists on the ground. The Aleppo Media Centre, based in the city, said at least 35 people were killed. Differing casualty figures are not uncommon.

The Aleppo Media Centre posted pictures online purportedly from the bus depot, showing small fires as medics carried away burned bodies on stretchers, a stream of blood under their feet.

Aleppo, once Syria's largest city, is a major battleground in the country's civil war, carved into rebel- and government-held neighbourhoods. Insurgents mostly control the countryside.

In a report this month, Amnesty International sharply condemned the government's reliance on barrel bombs, saying they killed over 3,000 civilians in Aleppo last year.

Meanwhile Tuesday, the international aid group Handicap International warned that Syria is so awash with weapons and bombs that the lives of 5.1 million people there, including 2 million children, are at constant risk. It called on all parties in the conflict to abide by international humanitarian law and immediately end the use of explosives in highly populated areas.

Syria's conflict, now in its fifth year, has killed more than 220,000 people. At least 1 million have been wounded.

Underlining the danger civilians face, two motorcycles rigged with explosives blew up in the central city of Homs, killing at least four people and wounding 28, Syrian state media said.

Daesh terror group claimed responsibility for the attacks, which it said were neighbourhoods that are mostly inhabited by members of President Bashar Assad's minority Alawite sect.

METLAOUI, Tunisia — Little stirs at mid-morning in the Tunisian town of Metlaoui; few shops are open and the local phosphate mine lies idle, blockaded by unemployed young men demanding the government fulfill the economic promises of their country's revolution.

Dozens of protest tents are pitched across the rural town with placards calling for "Dignity" and "Work". One ironic sign advertises: "We buy and sell University Diplomas" in a nod to desperation even among many graduates, four years after the revolution that has brought democracy but few jobs.

The camp scattered over hillsides surrounding the mine, normally a major export earner, is among scores of protests ranging from sit-ins and hunger strikes to riots that have erupted this month in southern Tunisia.

"We exhausted all our options," said Zied Salem, who graduated in mathematics nine years ago but made a living from smuggling until a government clampdown ended even that. "After the revolution we had a dream but now they stole our dream."

Salem warned Tunisia's democratically elected leaders that they risked suffering the same fate as autocrat Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, who fell in the 2011 revolution.

"If they do not provide us with jobs quickly, their lives will be darker. We will revolt and expel them like Ben Ali," said Salem, who pitched his tent in front of the phosphate company's office.

Despair is not new. In late 2010, a young man burned himself to death in protest, setting off the revolution that swept Tunisia to democracy and the region into uprisings.

Unlike many other Arab countries which have sunk into autocracy or chaos, Tunisia has fulfilled its political transition. But the economic tensions are testing its stability, with many Tunisians feeling their uprising has yet to deliver on easing living costs or boosting employment and development, especially in marginalised areas of the rural south.

It is unclear how far the protests can spread given the political progress, free elections and new constitution since 2011. But they are a potentially explosive risk for Prime Minister Habib Essid's coalition where his secular Nidaa Tounes Party governs under a deal with the Islamist Ennahda Party.

Official unemployment has risen from 11 per cent before the revolution to around 15 per cent now. Most Tunisians rank the high cost of living among their greatest concerns.

Already the unrest is taking an economic toll. The state-run Gafsa Phosphate Company, Tunisia's main exporter of the chemical, suspended operations in Metlaoui last week after the protests shut down its shipments by rail.

Along with tourism, the country relies heavily on phosphate exports for foreign currency. Officials say the sector, which employs 30,000 people, has lost about $2 billion over the last four years due to protests and strikes.

Lazhar Akremi, minister in charge of relations with parliament, said phosphate production should not be held hostage because it is a national resource. But he has promised the government will announce a package of local investment soon.

This cannot come too soon for Jalel Tabbassi, a local labour union official. "It is a real disaster," said Tabbassi. "People here are just seeking a glimmer of hope, they should start some projects so there is some trust in this government."

Hunger strikes

Tunisia has largely avoided the violence and turmoil afflicting other "Arab Spring" nations such as Yemen, Syria and Libya, thanks partly to compromise deals struck by politicians.

Essid's government, elected late last year, has promised economic reforms to match the political gains. But he has struggled to make progress on policies that international lenders want to cut back hefty public spending and create jobs.

Hussein Abassi, the leader of the powerful UGTT union, has warned the government about the growing social tensions.

President Beji Caid Essebsi has rejected suggestions of a second uprising, saying the state will provide for the jobless, but has warned that it has no "magic wand".

The opposition wants rapid action. "If the government does not take concrete measures in the next two weeks, the situation may become more complicated and perhaps we cannot control it," said Ammar Amroussia, a leader in the Popular Front Party.

Elsewhere, 20 unemployed youths have been on hunger strike for two months in the towns of Gabes and Jbenianas; most are university graduates. In the southern town of Faouar, police fired tear gas on Sunday to disperse hundreds of protesters who threw stones and burned a police station to demand development investment and jobs.

"I am 36 years and I have never had a job. My four brothers and I, we get money from my mother's pension," said Hedi Mansouri, a local protester. "If the government will not give us jobs, they'll get their redundancy letter very soon."