Five people were killed, including a senior army officer and three tribal militants, and nine soldiers injured in armed clashes which erupted on Friday between army troops and gunmen in Maareb province, northeast of Yemen. A higher Security Committee said in a press release that it has launched a military campaign to suppress tribal militants who prevented engineering teams to fix an oil pipeline, which was the target of a terrorist attack a few days ago in the Araq Al-Shabwan region. The statement noted that army forces intervened to secure the technical team, but gunmen attacked those troops with machine guns and RPG's. The committee pledged to prosecute all those involved in the disturbance and sabotage of operations there.