Yemeni army forces and allied fighters from Popular Committees have taken control of two military bases in Saudi Arabia’s southwestern border region of Najran in retaliation for Riyadh’s military campaign against their country.
The Yemeni forces took control of the bases in the mountainous northern part of the region, located 844 kilometers south of the capital, Riyadh, on Monday afternoon, Arabic-language al-Masirah television network reported.
Shortly afterwards, Yemeni soldiers and Popular Committees fighters fired a number of Katyusha rockets at a gathering of Saudi forces at Najran Regional Airport. There was no immediate report on the extent of damage inflicted and the number of casualties among Saudi forces.
Abu Hamdan and al-Sadis military bases in the same Saudi region also came under missile attacks by Yemeni forces.
The developments came on the same day that Yemeni artillery units pounded a position of Saudi-backed militiamen loyal to resigned president Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi in the Khabb wa ash Sha’af district of the country’s northern province of al-Jawf.
Meanwhile, Saudi fighter jets struck an area in the Kitaf wa Al Boqe’e district of Yemen’s northwestern province of Sa’ada, but no casualties were reported.
Saudi warplanes also carried out two separate airstrikes against Baqim district in Sa’ada Province, though no immediate reports of casualties were available.
Earlier on Monday, Saudi military aircraft bombarded a power station in the As Salif district of Yemen’s western coastal province of Hudaydah.
Saudi Arabia has been engaged in a deadly campaign against Yemen since March 2015 in an attempt to bring back the former Yemeni government to power and undermine the Houthi Ansarullah movement.
The impoverished Arab country is grappling with the scarcity of food supplies and outbreak of diseases amid Saudi Arabia’s atrocious airstrikes.
The United Nations International Children’s Fund (UNICEF) says 7.4 million Yemeni children are in dire need of medical help, and 370,000 run the risk of severe acute malnutrition.
