AFP - A Yemeni court on Sunday jailed six Shiite Zaidi rebels for between five and 10 years over deadly clashes near the capital that killed hundreds of people in 2008.

The court, which specialises in security cases, sentenced Waleed al-Moayed, aged 26 and a former army captain, and Salem Hussein, 50, to 10 years.

Yasser al-Wazeer, 28, Hussein al-Aghrabi, 19, and Mohammed al-Shahari, 30, were jailed for eight years.

And Ahmed al-Wazeer, 25, was imprisoned for five years.

Those convicted belonged to a group of 190 rebels who are being tried in batches over fighting that raged in Bani Hoshaish, just outside Sanaa, between March and June 2008.

Their sentences bring to 42 the number of those condemned over "belonging to an armed group and carrying out a terrorist criminal plot that resulted in the death of many soldiers and citizens."

In August, the army launched a fresh offensive against the rebels in the mountainous north that is aimed at eradicating their five-year rebellion.

Yemeni authorities accuse the rebels of being supported by groups in Iran and of seeking to reinstate a form of clerical rule that ended in a republican coup in 1962. The rebels deny both claims.

An offshoot of Shiite Islam, Zaidis are a minority in mainly Sunni Yemen but form the majority in the north.