Coalition airstrike 'wipes out' family of sixteen in Yemen

At least 16 members of a family were killed when a Saudi-led coalition airstrike hit their home on Wednesday, witnesses said.

The victims all belonged to the family of a local imam, Saleh Abu Zainah, who was also killed in the attack in Yemen’s northern Saada region, the stronghold of the Houthi rebels.

"The air raid happened in the morning and because the house was made of mud, it took us until noon to be able to dig the bodies out," local resident Nayef told Reuters as he helped recover the corpses.

On Sunday, coalition fighter jets struck a rebel convoy near a taxi stand in central Yemen, killing seven civilians and nine insurgents, officials said.

The airstrikes hit three vehicles belonging to the Houthi rebels near the Mafraq Sharab junction outside the southwestern city of Taiz, a military official said.

Medical sources said hospitals in Taiz received the bodies of seven civilians, while military sources said nine rebels were killed and 14 people were wounded.

Around half of all civilian deaths in Yemen were killed in Saudi-led coalition airstrikes, a UN report suggested.

UN figures said on Tuesday that the death toll in Yemen's conflict has reached 10,000, an increase from estimates of more than 6,000 cited by officials and aid workers for much of 2016.