Family of three killed in Yemen as Saudi-led coalition bombs Sanaa

A Saudi-led coalition airstrike on the rebel-held Yemeni capital has killed at least six people and wounded 10.

2 min read

16 May, 2019

Yemen airstrike kills family

Warplanes struck in and around the rebel-held Yemeni capital on Thursday two days after the insurgents claimed drone strikes that shut a key oil pipeline in neighbouring Saudi Arabia, the rebels and witnesses said.

A Saudi-led coalition airstrike on rebel-held Sanaa killed at least six people and wounded 10, a local doctor told AFP.

The casualties were all brought into the Republican Hospital from the same Sanaa neighbourhood, Dr Mokhtar Mohammed said.

A medic at the al-Manar city hospital told reporters that the bodies of three civilians killed in the strikes were brought to the hospital morgue. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn't authorized to speak to the media.

Fawza Ahmed, a middle-aged broker, told The Associated Press he saw the three bodies being retrieved from the rubble - a father, his child and his wife, all buried together.

The rebels' Al-Masirah television blamed "aircraft of the (Saudi-led) aggression".

In an initial tweet, the broadcaster reported six strikes on the Arhab district of Sanaa province. It then reported further strikes, including one in Sanaa itself.

On Tuesday, the Houthi rebels claimed responsibility for twin drone strikes on Saudi Arabia's main east-west oil pipeline, saying that they were a response to "crimes" committed by Riyadh during the bloody air war it has led in Yemen since March 2015.

The pipeline, which can carry five million barrels of crude per day, provides a strategic alternative route for Saudi exports if the shipping lane from the Gulf through the Strait of Hormuz is closed.

Iran has repeatedly threatened to close the vital conduit for global oil supplies in case of a military confrontation with the United States.

The Saudi-led coalition backing the Yemeni government confirmed that its warplanes were bombing rebel targets on Thursday following rebel drone attacks that closed a Saudi pipeline.

"We have begun to launch air strikes targeting sites operated by the Huthi militia, including in Sanaa," a coalition official, who declined to be identified, told AFP.

Saudi Arabia and its allies intervened in Yemen when President Abedrabbo Mansour Hadi fled into Saudi exile as the rebels closed in on his last refuge in Yemen's second city Aden after sweeping through most of the rest of the country.

The intervention has retaken much of the south but the capital and most of the populous central highlands remain in rebel hands.