The personal cost of tyranny in the Arab world is rising. Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali escaped from Tunisia to Saudi Arabia, Hosni Mubarak of Egypt is to stand trial for murder and corruption, and now Ali Abdullah Saleh of Yemen has been evacuated to Riyadh with burns and a shrapnel wound.

In each case, the president, once supported by the West as a stabilising factor, resisted the demands of protesters and became a liability. Mr Saleh, who repeatedly equivocated over a peace plan proposed by the Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC), had long passed that point. Instead of the “honourable exit” which he said he sought, he has suffered the humiliation of being injured in a rocket attack on his palace in Sana’a and forced to seek medical treatment abroad.”

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