Sunday Times 2
Yemen rebels quit Aden palace, Qaeda makes gains
View(s):ADEN, April 4 (AFP) -Saudi-led air raids drove back rebels in the last stronghold of Yemen’s absent president Friday, while Al-Qaeda militants seized a major army base in the southeast.
The impoverished Arabian Peninsula state has sunk further into chaos since the coalition spearheaded by Riyadh launched Operation Decisive Storm on March 26 to try to halt the advance by Shiite Huthi rebels.
The turmoil has raised fears that Al-Qaeda will expand its foothold in the deeply tribal country, which borders oil-rich Saudi Arabia and lies near key shipping routes.
On Friday the Sunni extremists captured unopposed the regional army headquarters in Mukalla, capital of the southeastern province of Hadramawt, a military official said.
They now control nearly all of the city, where they stormed a jail and freed 300 inmates a day earlier.
UN aid chief Valerie Amos said Thursday that 519 people had been killed and nearly 1,700 wounded in two weeks of fighting, adding that she was “extremely concerned” for the safety of trapped civilians.
Alexey Zaytsev, spokesman for the Russian mission at the United Nations, said the UN Security Council would meet on Saturday at 1500 GMT to discuss a Russian proposal for “possible humanitarian pauses in air strikes”.
The conflict has sent tensions soaring between Iran and Saudi Arabia, the foremost Shiite and Sunni Muslim powers in the Middle East. Iran has angrily rejected accusations of arming the rebels, who have allied with military units loyal to former president Ali Abdullah Saleh to seize large parts of Yemen, including the capital Sanaa.
After a night of intense coalition bombardment, rebel forces withdrew from President Abedrabbo Mansour Hadi’s palace in Aden, a senior official said. They had captured the hilltop complex a day earlier in a symbolic blow to Hadi, who had already fled to Saudi Arabia.
Logistical’ airdrop
“The Huthi militia and their allies withdrew before dawn from the Al-Maashiq palace,” said the official in Aden.
The rebels retreated to the nearby central district of Khor Maksar, where 12 rebels were reported killed by pro-Hadi militiamen overnight.
The coalition airdropped rifles, ammunition and communications equipment to Hadi supporters in Aden, a port official said.
In Riyadh, coalition spokesman General Ahmed Assiri confirmed the parachute drop of “logistical support of all kinds”.
He also told reporters coalition aircraft destroyed Huthi “military equipment and missiles” on Myun island in the strategic Bab al-Mandab Strait late Thursday.
Assiri said the campaign was only in its ninth day.
“We should not be in a rush,” he said. “The campaign is achieving its goals, and you can see that every day.”
| At least 185 dead in battle for Aden-medics ADEN, April 4 (AFP) -Fierce fighting for control of Yemen’s main southern city Aden has left at least 185 people dead and more than 1,200 wounded, including many civilians, a medical official said today. The port city, a last foothold of supporters of absent President Abedrabbo Mansour Hadi, has been shaken by more than a week of clashes between Shiite rebels and loyalist militia backed by Saudi-led air strikes. At least 185 dead and 1,282 wounded from the fighting have been counted in hospitals in Aden since March 26, the city’s health department director Al-Kheder Lassouar said. Three-quarters were civilians, he added. The toll does not include victims among the Huthi Shiite rebels and their allies who do not take their casualties to public hospitals, he said. |