Over 110 killed as Yemeni forces mount new offensive to push Saudi-led mercenaries out of Ma’rib

Fierce clashes between Yemeni forces and Saudi-led militants loyal to former president Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi have killed more than 110 in Ma’rib over the past three days.

Latest media reports said tens of fighters from both sides were killed in the ongoing fighting as Yemeni forces wage a renewed battle to liberate the strategic northern city.

Local sources said that since Thursday, the Yemeni troops and allied Popular Committees fighters had mounted intensive attacks from the north, south and west to push the Saudi mercenaries out of the region.

“These areas witnessed fierce fighting amid artillery shelling from both sides and intense coalition air raids,” they said.

Sources close to ex-president Hadi claimed that at least 29 mercenaries and at least 82 Yemeni troops had been killed in the clashes.

Yemen's Arabic-language al-Masirah television network reported that Saudi warplanes conducted more than a dozen strikes on residential areas across the region late on Saturday. 

Over the past few weeks, Ma’rib has been the scene of large-scale operations by Yemeni troops, who are pushing against Saudi-sponsored pro-Hadi militants.

Yemeni forces are closing in on Ma’rib, the last stronghold of pro-Hadi forces in northern Yemen, the loss of which would mean the defeat of the Saudi-backed regime.

Yemeni forces had earlier liberated several strategic heights in the northwest of the province after intense fighting. They wrested control of Hama Dhiab and al-Nadhoud hills from the Saudi-led forces, which include Hadi loyalists and militants affiliated with the Salafist Islah Party.

Meanwhile, Saudi warplanes have stepped up their airstrikes, bombing various regions, including Sirwah district, in the province in regular intervals.

Sirwah district hosts around 30,000 people displaced in harsh conditions as a result of earlier fighting, and the UN has repeatedly warned in recent weeks of a humanitarian crisis for civilians because of the current battles.

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Yemen's National Salvation Government has demanded concrete measures be taken to assuage the suffering of the Yemeni people.

Observers say Ma’rib’s potential liberation would restore Yemen’s command over its rich oil resources and open the gateway for further advances across the country, given the province’s strategic location.

Separately, Arab media said early Sunday that Yemeni armed forces also carried out drone and ballistic missile operations in southern Saudi Arabia in retaliation for the Riyadh regime’s devastating military campaign and crippling blockade against its impoverished neighbor. The Yemeni operation targeted Najran province and the city of Khamis Mushait.

Yemeni army launches retaliatory drone, missile strikes on Saudi Arabia

Yemeni Armed Forces have carried out drone and ballistic missile operations in southern Saudi Arabia in retaliation for the Riyadh regime’s devastating military campaign and crippling blockade against its impoverished neighbor.

A Saudi-led coalition began waging a hugely indiscriminate war on Yemen in 2015. The war has been seeking to restore power to Yemen’s former officials, who have been loyal friends to Riyadh and trying to deploy the kingdom’s agendas in its southern neighbor.

Tens of thousands of Yemenis have died and the entire country, which was already the Arab world’s poorest nation, has been pushed close to the brink of outright famine.

Yemen’s army and Popular Committees have, however, never laid down their arms in the face of the heavily Western-armed coalition.

They have staged numerous daring counterattacks against the kingdom, including its oil facilities and capital, and made surprise advances in the western province of Ma’rib to the sheer alarm of Riyadh and its supporters.

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