Over 50 killed in fighting – Yemen rebels gain ground

This news has been read 6991 times!

ADEN, Nov 8, (Agencies): More than 50 people were killed in Yemen in the past two days in fighting pitting an Arab coalition against Houthi fighters backed by troops loyal to former president Ali Abdullah Saleh, medical sources and residents said on Sunday. In Taiz, medical sources told Reuters 29 people including eight civilians were killed in clashes in Yemen’s third largest city, where relief workers have said fighting has blocked food supplies and left thousands of people in extreme hunger.

About 30 people were killed in fighting in Damt district in Dhalea governorate in the south, residents said. At least 5,600 people have been killed in seven months of war in Yemen, the poorest country on the Arabian Peninsula, and the United Nations says the humanitarian situation, exacerbated by the Arab coalition’s blockade of Yemeni ports, grows worse every day.

The conflict pits the Iran-allied Houthis and army units loyal to Saleh against armed groups who support exiled President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi alongside a Saudi-led Arab coalition. The coalition is fighting to restore Hadi to power following the Houthis’ seizure of control of much of Yemen in late 2014 and early 2015, and reverse what it sees as an expansion of influence by Iran, the regional rival of Riyadh.

Residents and officials said that pro-Hadi forces seized of two strategic entrepots to the city of Damt on Sunday after being air dropped weapons by coalition warplanes, solidifying their control over southern Yemen. Peace efforts have made only limited progress. All major combatants have publicly agreed to implement UN Security Council Resolution 2216, which calls on Houthi and Saleh forces to withdraw from the country’s main cities and surrender arms captured from Yemeni government forces.

But while Hadi and the coalition have previously demanded that this happen before talks begin, the Houthis and Saleh want talks to address the mechanism for implementing Resolution 2216. Meanwhile, Yemen’s Iran-backed rebels have regained several positions lost in recent months across the country’s south, in a fresh push towards the Gulfbacked government’s temporary headquarters in port city Aden, military sources said Sunday. In Lahj province, which borders Aden, rebels are now positioned on a hill overlooking the strategic Al-Anad airbase, according to the sources.

The base currently houses Sudanese forces from a Saudi-led coalition that has been battling rebels across Yemen since March. The rebel deployment near Al-Anad, which took place without fighting, “poses a real danger to pro-government and coalition forces,” a military source told AFP. Backed by coalition strikes, supplies and troops, loyalist forces launched a major counter-offensive in July, pushing the rebels out of Aden and four other southern provinces — Lahj, Daleh, Abyan, and Shabwa. Saturday fighting between the rebels and loyalist troops in Al-Madaribah in southwestern Yemen on the border between Lahj and Taez provinces meanwhile left casualties on both sides, according to pro-government sources. The rebels also retook the second city in Daleh province, Damt, after besieging it for hours and clashing with loyalist troops there, military sources said.

Meanwhile, another cyclone made landfall in war-ravaged Yemen’s Socotra island Sunday, causing panic as a minister posted an “urgent appeal” to save residents from the second tropical storm in a week. At least two people were killed and dozens injured, a government source said. Heavy winds, rain, and flash floods swept through Socotra as the storm, named Megh, hit the island, already badly battered by last week’s cyclone Chapala, residents said. Fisheries Minister Fahd Kavieen, who is from Socotra himself, urged the United Nations and neighbouring Oman to “urgently intervene with emergency teams to save residents” on the island “which is now facing a cyclone stronger than Chapala”. The Arabian Sea island is 350 kms (210 miles) off the Yemeni mainland.

This news has been read 6991 times!