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Egypt launches 1st strike against Yemen's Houthis: Coalition
09 April 2015 20:35 (Last updated 09 April 2015 20:36)
Egypt has launched its first airstrikes against positions belonging to the Shiite Houthi group in Yemen, a Saudi-led coalition said
RIYADH
Egypt has launched its first airstrikes against positions belonging to the Shiite Houthi group in Yemen, a Saudi-led coalition said Thursday.
"An Egyptian warplane has carried out a raid against a Houthi target," coalition spokesman Ahmed al-Asiri said in a daily briefing.
Since March 25, warplanes from Saudi Arabia and several Arab allies have pounded Houthi positions across
Yemen.
Al-Asiri said that Houthi militias had been "cut off from their leadership."
He went on to assert that airstrikes were targeting communications between Houthi leaders in capital Sanaa and those in the northern Saada province.
Fractious
Yemen has remained in turmoil since last September, when the Houthis overran Sanaa, from which they have sought to extend their influence to other parts of the country.
Riyadh says the anti-Houthi campaign comes in response to appeals by embattled Yemeni President Abd Rabbuh Mansour Hadi – who is currently in Saudi Arabia – to "save the [Yemeni] people from the Houthi militias."
The Houthis, for their part, have decried the offensive, describing it as unwarranted "Saudi-American aggression" against
Yemen.
Some Gulf States accuse Shiite Iran of supporting Yemen's Houthi insurgency.
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Friday, 10 April 2015
Several senior members of Houthi militias and forces allied to deposed Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh were killed during an air strike by the Saudi-led coalition, reported Al Arabiya News Channel on Thursday.
The air strike targeted a gathering of Houthi and Saleh militias in the governorate of Amran, just north of Sanaa.
The news comes after earlier reports that coalition jets bombed a military airport in the city of Ataq in the Shabwa province.
Air strikes by the Saudi-led coalition also targeted Yemen's defense ministry and military catering buildings in the capital Sanaa which are controlled by Houthi militias and their supporters, Agence France Press cited witnesses saying earlier on Thursday.
Three explosions were heard as warplanes hit the building in central Sanaa and thick smoke billowed over the area, according to AFP.
The attack was part of raids that struck positions across the capital, including a base of the elite Republican Guards in Fajj Attan, in south Sanaa.
The Republican Guard is a force that has remained loyal to deposed president Ali Abdullah Saleh, who stepped down in 2012 following nationwide protests against his three-decade rule and who is allied with the Houthi militias against the government.
[With AFP]