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9 Yemeni civilians, including 6 kids, killed in Saudi airstrike

Friday, 03 April 2015 8:53 PM [ Last Update: Friday, 03 April 2015 11:07 PM ]

A Yemeni man receives treatment at the burn unit of a hospital in Sana’a on April 1, 2015, following an airstrike by Saudi Arabia in the area of Yarim south of the capital the day before. © AFP

Nine civilians, including six children, have been killed in a Saudi airstrike on a three-floor building in the Yemeni province of Sana’a.

Five other people were also injured after the Saudi warplanes targeted the building in Hajar Akkash village in the Bani Matar district late on Friday night.

Saudi Arabia’s air campaign against Yemen’s Ansarullah revolutionaries of the Houthi movement started on March 26 in a bid to restore power to fugitive former Yemeni president, Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi, a close ally of Riyadh.

*People gather around a crater left following a Saudi airstrike on the Yemeni capital city of Sana’a, March 28, 2015. © AFP*

UN Under-Secretary General for Humanitarian Affairs Valerie Amos said in a statement on Thursday, at least 519 people, including women and children, have so far lost their lives in two weeks of violence in Yemen, as Saudi Arabia's airstrikes continue unabated.

She added that 1,700 people have been also wounded during clashes between rival groups in Yemen and due to the Saudi strikes against the country.

The UN official said 90 children are among the victims of the violence and expressed concern “for the safety of civilians caught in the middle.”

The Saudi airstrikes have drawn international outcry and people launched rallies in several countries to condemn the heinous attacks.

*Kashmiri protesters in Srinagar shout slogans during a demonstration against Saudi airstrikes on Yemen, April 3, 2015. © AFP*

Hadi stepped down in January and refused to reconsider the decision despite calls by the Houthi Ansarullah movement.

However, the Ansarullah movement later said Hadi had lost his legitimacy as president of Yemen after he escaped Sana’a to Aden in February.

Saudi Defense Minister Mohammed bin Salman bin Abdul Aziz al-Saud (R) receives Yemen’s fugitive president, Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi, upon his arrival in the Saudi capital city of Riyadh, March 26, 2015. © AFP

On March 25, the embattled president fled the southern city of Aden, where he had sought to set up a rival power base, to the Saudi capital, Riyadh, after Ansarullah revolutionaries advanced on Aden.

The Ansarullah fighters took control of the Yemeni capital in September 2014 and are currently moving southward. The revolutionaries said Hadi’s government was incapable of properly running the affairs of the country and containing the growing wave of corruption and terror.

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