Clashes between the Yemeni army and followers of a Shia rebel leader in the north of the country have killed more than 100 people in the past five days.
About 90 of the dead were in the Yemeni army, including six killed yesterday, an army official said.
Government forces have bombarded areas where followers of Abdel-Malek al-Hawthi are believed to be hiding out in Saada, about 112 miles north of the capital San'a.
Close to 200 army and police officers have been killed in clashes in recent weeks.
There are no official statistics on rebels casualties, but tribal officials have estimated that more than 100 have been killed since the clashes broke out in late January.
Last week, members of the Yemen Supreme Defense Council voiced concerns, saying the Shia rebels were receiving funds and assistance from outside countries, according to one of the council's members.
State-owned newspapers have reported that the government suspects Iran and Libya are backing the rebellion.
Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh accused the rebels of being "ignorant forces of darkness who adopted deviant terrorist and racist ideas." They "don't believe in democracy or freedom. They are agents who have sold themselves to harm the nation and its interests," he said, according to the official news agency.
The rebels are part of a Shia Muslim group known as "The Young Faithful Believers" that accuses the government of being corrupt and too close to the West.
Yemen has largely allied itself with the United States in the "war on terror".
The government has been fighting the rebels since June 2004 when rebel Shia cleric Hussein Badr Eddin al-Hawthi - the brother of the current leader - led his forces in an uprising.
The cleric was killed in clashes with government troops in September 2004.