RIYADH, Saudi Arabia - March 11, 2011 - A security clampdown in the Saudi capital kept a lid on a planned day of rage Friday, while determined police action in neighboring Kuwait and Bahrain appeared to deflate demonstrators' zeal.
Rallies after Friday prayers have proved decisive in popular uprisings that have overthrown the rulers of Tunisia and Egypt. But the heavy police turnout in some major Gulf cities managed to put a lid on discontent that some say has surfaced in the region.
Yemen, by contrast, continued to see massive, countrywide protests, with President Ali Abdullah Saleh struggling to maintain his 32-year-grip on power.
Unlike in Yemen, Saudi activists on the Internet called for reform rather than revolution and announced plans for rallies Friday in defiance of an official ban on such gatherings in the world's top oil exporter.
But no one showed up in Riyadh, perhaps deterred by police.
The muted response to the Internet appeal helped push oil prices lower Friday. Markets had been jittery about the prospect of upheaval in Saudi Arabia, which has guaranteed oil supplies to the west for decades.
In Saudi Arabia's oil-rich east, however, several hundred Shi'ite protesters rallied in at least four Shi'ite towns, less wealthy or developed than Riyadh, to demand the release of prisoners held for years without trial.
Shi'ite towns have seen scattered demonstrations over the last three weeks, inspired protests in nearby Bahrain. Saudi Shi'ites complain of discrimination in the face of the country's dominant Sunni majority.
In Bahrain, the Shi'ites are in the majority, but still complain of discrimination at the hands of the Sunni elite.
Bahraini police blocked several thousand protesters from reaching the royal palace Friday, after the Interior Ministry had warned such a march would provoke clashes between the Shi'ite activists and Sunnis residents.
Police pushed back a group of rock-throwing Sunnis who approached police lines and fired tear gas to disperse Shi'ites trying to get around their roadblock.
"I say to all our people, Sunnis and Shi'ite, that it is forbidden to shed the blood of anyone under any pretext," Bahrain's top Shi'ite Muslim cleric, Sheikh Issa Qassim, said in his Friday sermon, seeking to avoid a sectarian conflict.
In Kuwait, further to the north, a small demonstration by stateless Arabs was met with volleys of tear gas, as police swiftly broke up a small crowd that had gathered after prayers.
In Yemen, fighting broke out between small groups of government supporters and protesters after record crowds had flooded the capital Sanaa, demanding a change of leader. Almost 30 people have died in the recent disturbances.
"Leaving means leaving. There isn't a better option," crowds chanted in a protest billed as a "Friday of no return."
