19 killed in coalition strikes, clashes in south Yemen

At least 19 people have been killed in Saudi-led coalition air strikes and clashes between pro-government forces and rebels in Yemen's south, military sources said on Saturday.
The air strikes took place late Friday and targeted two rebel vehicles on a road linking the central province of Ibb to Daleh further south, the sources said.

Forces loyal to Gulf-backed President Abedrabbo Mansour Hadi recaptured Daleh and four other southern provinces in July.

Loyalist forces also clashed with Iran-backed Huthi rebels and their allies on the outskirts of Daleh's second-largest city Damt on Friday, the sources said.

Eight pro-government fighters and 11 rebels were killed in the clashes and air strikes, they added.

In Saudi Arabia, the civil defence announced late on Friday the death of a Saudi woman and her three-month-old baby in the border city of Najran when a missile fired from Yemen crashed into their home, the official SPA news agency said.
he Saudi-led coalition, in which the United Arab Emirates has played a key role, has been battling rebel forces who since last year have controlled the capital Sanaa, as well as much of northern and central Yemen.

The UAE, which has lost 68 soldiers fighting as part of the coalition, on Saturday welcomed the first group of its soldiers returning from Yemen, the official WAM news agency said.

They were replaced by a second group, it added, without giving their numbers.

Thousands of Emirati troops have reportedly been deployed in the war-ravaged country, the first time the Gulf country has sent ground troops to a conflict abroad.

Western sources this week indicated that only a limited number of UAE special forces will now remain in Yemen.

In early September, a missile strike on a coalition base in Yemen's Marib province killed 67 coalition soldiers, 52 of whom were Emiratis.

The United Nations says around 5,000 people have been killed and 25,000 wounded, many of them civilians, in Yemen's conflict since it escalated in March.

In Saudi Arabia, more than 70 people have been killed from border shelling and skirmishes since the coalition campaign began. Soldiers have accounted for most of the border casualties.

Source: AFP