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SAUDI ARABIA

Yemeni rebels claim to hold soldiers

RIYADH | Yemen's Shi'ite rebels said they captured some Saudi soldiers Friday, after Riyadh said it would press on with its offensive until it had cleared them from its territory.

A Saudi official said Thursday that Riyadh had launched air strikes on rebels in northern Yemen after the Shi'ite insurgents made a cross-border raid earlier in the week.

But the Saudi Press Agency said Friday the strikes were "focused on infiltrators in Jabal Dukhan and other targets within the range of operations within Saudi territory."

Rebel Yemeni spokesman Mohammed Abdel-Salam claimed the capture of soldiers in a telephone interview on Al Jazeera television. Saudi officials were not immediately available for comment. Mr. Abdel-Salam did not say how many soldiers were in rebel hands.

SPAIN

Demand to free pirates rejected

MADRID | Spain said Friday it would not free two captured pirates as demanded by fellow brigands who are holding a Spanish trawler and 33 crew members off the coast of Somalia.

Three crewmen who had been removed from the vessel and taken to the Somali mainland by hijackers to add pressure on Spain to repatriate the arrested pirates were returned to the ship late Friday, Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos said.