The security situation in Yemen continued to further deteriorate on Wednesday as citizens took to the streets to protest against the country's news rulers, and Britain and France closed their embassies.

Thousands of demonstrators took Sanaa, the Yemeni capital, and the central city of Taiz to voice their opposition to the takeover by a Shiite Muslim militia group, Reuters reported. Protesters carried banners and chanted anti-Houthi slogans.

The fighters, known as Houthis, responded by shooting in the air and thrusting daggers at the crowds defying their rule. Houthis also manned checkpoints and guarded government buildings they control.

The turmoil comes four years after Yemenis ousted their longtime autocratic ruler only to see a political transition crumble between tribal politics, sectarian divisions, al-Qaida militancy and succession movements.

"We are doing this because we oppose the coup, and we want a return to a state that is run by civil institutions, not a militia," Ibrahim al-Jabri, an activist from Taiz who participated in the protests, told the Washington Post.

The United States on Tuesday announced it was closing its embassy in Sanaa, and the U.S. ambassador and diplomatic staff left the complex on Wednesday. Embassy workers had destroyed weapons, computers and documents kept at the premises, local workers told Reuters.

"Recent unilateral actions disrupted the political transition process in Yemen, creating the risk that renewed violence would threaten Yemenis and the diplomatic community in Sanaa," U.S. State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said.

Rebels, meanwhile, seized more than 25 vehicles abandoned by departing American embassy staffers at Sanaa's airport, according to AP. The militants also took weapons that were left in the cars, unnamed officials told the news service.

With the U.S. mission shuttered, the French Embassy in Sanaa followed suit on Wednesday, saying it would suspend operations, the Washington Post reported. The United Kingdom also announced that it had withdrawn its diplomats from the country.

"The security situation in Yemen has continued to deteriorate over recent days," Tobias Ellwood, a minister for the Middle East at Britain's Foreign Office, said in a statement.

The Iranian-backed militants, who overran Sanaa in September and formally took power last week, are "stridently anti-American," according to Reuters.