SANAA - Yemeni government forces and thousands of anti-government protesters clashed Tuesday in the capital Sanaa and southern Taiz city, leaving at least 10 people dead, according to medics and witnesses.

"A protester was shot dead in his head, another one was run over to death by armored vehicle belonging to the government Central Security Forces, increasing the death toll in Sanaa to three," doctor Mohamed al-Qubati, head of a field hospital at a square occupied by protesters, told Xinhua.

Earlier, al-Qubati said one protester was confirmed killed by a gunshot of the government troops in Sanaa.

"More than 50 protesters were wounded by live rounds and were hospitalized in the private hospitals, 10 of them in critical conditions, and some 200 others suffered suffocation from tear gas while about five demonstrators suffered severe burns on their skins after the forces splashed them with highly concentrated acid," al-Qubati added.

In Taiz, some 200 km south of Sanaa, medics and eyewitnesses there confirmed that "a mother and her daughter were gunned down during the march, bringing the toll by gunshots of the government forces to seven, including a 13-year-old child."

"More than 30 protesters were hit by live ammunition, batons or smoke bombs," a medic at the makeshift hospital in the so-called Change Square said.

The witnesses said thousands of protesters marched in Sanaa and Taiz Tuesday calling for President Ali Abdullah Saleh to sign a Gulf-brokered deal and step down.

They said that both marches were intercepted by government forces and protesters used rocks to defend themselves.

Meanwhile, Taiz was also rattled by heavy shelling between Saleh's forces and armed tribesmen claiming to protect the protesters since overnight, according to the eyewitnesses.

Medics said about 12 civilians were wounded in the overnight shelling, as the months-long clashes forced thousands of residents to flee the war-torn city. ? ? ?

Yemen has gripped by a political crisis since the eruption of protest in late January demanding an end of Saleh's 33-year rule.

Saleh on Monday welcomed the United Nations Security Council resolution which called on him to stop using violence and to sign the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) initiative and step aside.

He said his "ruling party is willing to engage in peaceful dialogue with the opposition as soon as possible to agree on a mechanism to implement the GCC initiative."