Oct 19 (Reuters) – At least 18 people were killed in an attack on Monday by the Iran-aligned Houthis on a government security forces training camp in Yemen’s Shabwa province, four government and medical sources told Reuters, as fighting in the impoverished country intensifies.
The Houthis and the internationally recognised government, which is backed by a Saudi-led coalition, have been trading attacks since the group advanced in September towards territory near the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, a shipping chokepoint at the mouth of the Red Sea.
The people from the government, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the Houthis launched three ballistic missiles at security forces during a training exercise. Shabwa is an energy-rich province in coastal south-central Yemen.
Government forces this month began a campaign aimed at recapturing areas controlled by the Houthis, recovering ground near the strait, while the group besieges Taiz, the last major urban stronghold of anti-Houthi forces in the southern highland area of Yemen.
The conflict in Yemen has become another front line in the wider US-Israeli war on Iran as the Houthis have escalated their attacks on Saudi Arabia, the world’s largest crude exporter, targeting Riyadh’s international airport and the state oil company Saudi Aramco.
War broke out in Yemen in 2014 when the Houthis seized the capital Sanaa, driving the government south. A Saudi-led military intervention the following year led to a bloody stalemate until the sides agreed a 2022 truce that held until this year.
Yemen is already one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises, with aid agencies warning of rapidly deteriorating conditions there.
(Reporting by Mohammed Ghobari; Writing by Menna Alaa El-Din and Nayera Abdallah; Editing by Kevin Liffey, Saad Sayeed and Hugh Lawson)
