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4 Indian nurses among 16 dead in gun attack on Yemen care home

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Yemen

Aden: Four Indian nurses were among at least 16 people killed today when gunmen opened fire at an elderly care home in Yemen’s main southern city of Aden, security officials said.

Four gunmen stormed the care home in Aden’s Sheikh Othman district, killing a guard and shooting randomly at residents, the officials told AFP. Dozens of stricken family members arrived at the site following the attack, witnesses said.

One official said the attackers were “extremists” and blamed the Islamic State group, which has been gaining ground in Aden in recent months.

But no group claimed responsibility for the attack, the first of its kind in Yemen, where the internationally- recognised government is grappling with an Iran-backed rebellion on one side and a growing jihadist presence on the other.

President Abedrabbo Mansour Hadi has declared Aden Yemen’s temporary capital as Sanaa remains in the hands of the Huthi rebels and their allies since they seized it in September 2014.

Al-Qaeda and IS have stepped up attacks in Aden despite the efforts of the government and its backers in a Saudi-led coalition battling the Huthis and their allies to secure it.

However, most of the jihadists’ attacks have targeted coalition forces and pro-government Yemeni troops.

On Monday, a suicide car bombing, also in Sheikh Othman, hit a gathering of loyalist forces killing four people and wounding five others, according to a security official said.

On February 17, a suicide bombing claimed by IS killed 14 soldiers. The rebels controlled Aden for months before government loyalists pushed them out in July.

Because of the unrest gripping Aden, Hadi himself and many senior officials in his government spend most of their time in Riyadh.

(AFP)

US drone strike kills senior al-Qaeda leader in Yemen

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Jalal Baleedi, a field commander in the country’s south, was killed with his guards in Shabwa province.

The US has continued a drone campaign in Yemen targeting al-Qaeda figures [EPA]

The US has continued a drone campaign in Yemen targeting al-Qaeda figures [EPA]

by Al Jazeera

One of al-Qaeda’s senior commanders was killed by a US drone strike in southern Yemen, a military source told Al Jazeera.

Fighters belonging to al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) were preparing to receive the body of Jalal Baleedi, also known as Hamza al-Marqashi, after he was killed overnight with two of his guards near the town of Azzan, the source, speaking on condition of anonymity, said on Thursday.

Reuters news agency also reported another US drone attack that killed six alleged al-Qaeda fighters in their car travelling in Yemen’s southern Shabwa province.

Al-Qaeda fighters took over Azzan on Monday, and it has become the group’s stronghold in Shabwa.

Originally from Yemen’s mountainous Abyan province, Baleedi was identified in 2004 by the Yemen Times as being the field commander of AQAP in the southern governorates of Abyan, Shabwa, Lahj, Hadramout, and al-Beidha.

Recent reports suggested  Baleedi pledged allegiance to and joined the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant group with several other AQAP fighters, becoming the leader of ISIL in Yemen.

However, the reports were not confirmed by ISIL nor by AQAP.

Iran accuses Saudi Arabia of Yemen embassy air strike

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Saudi-led coalition says it is investigating accusation that its jets “deliberately” struck Iran’s embassy in Sanaa.

yemen

by Al Jazeera

Iran has accused the Saudi-led coaliton of an air strike on its embassy in the Yemeni capital Sanaa amid rising tensions between Tehran and Riyadh.

Iran’s foreign ministry said on Thursday that Saudi jets “deliberately” struck its embassy in an air raid that injured staff.

“This deliberate action by Saudi Arabia is a violation of all international conventions that protect diplomatic missions,” foreign ministry spokesman Hossein Jaber Ansari was quoted as saying by state television.

“The Saudi government is responsible for the damage caused and for the situation of members of staff who were injured,” Ansari added, without specifying when the alleged strike took place.

The Saudi-led coalition fighting in Yemen will investigate Iran’s accusation, coalition spokesman Brigadier General Ahmed Asseri said, according to a Reuters news agency report.

Asseri said coalition jets carried out heavy strikes in Sanaa on Wednesday night targeting missile launchers used by Houthi fighters against Saudi Arabia.

He added that Houthis had used civilian facilities, including abandoned embassies.

Asseri said the coalition had requested all countries to supply it with coordinates of the location of their diplomatic missions and that accusations made on the basis of information provided by the Houthis “have no credibility”.

 

Tensions between the two regional heavyweights, which support opposite sides in the war in Yemen, have risen in recent days.

On Sunday, Saudi Arabia severed relations with Iran after an attack on its embassy in Tehran following the kingdom’s execution of Shia religious leader Nimr al-Nimr, who was put to death along with 46 other mostly Sunni convicts on terrorism charges.

Yemen: Houthis take strategic mountain in Taiz

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Supporters of Houthi rebels and militiamen shout slogans during a rally against the Saudi-led coalition, which has been leading the war against the Iran-backed rebels, on December 15, 2015 in Sanaa. (AFP/Abdel Rahman Abdallah)

Supporters of Houthi rebels and militiamen shout slogans during a rally against the Saudi-led coalition, which has been leading the war against the Iran-backed rebels, on December 15, 2015 in Sanaa. (AFP/Abdel Rahman Abdallah)

by Press TV

Houthi rebels and allied forces have captured a strategic mountain in the southwestern province of Ta’izz.

Yemen’s al-Masirah TV network reported on Wednesday that the Houthi forces were able to take Mount Jubah in the al-Mesrakh district of Ta’izz and kill a number of Saudi mercenaries.

According to the report, several Saudi-backed forces were also killed or captured during a raid on al-Shukah Mountain in Ta’izz.

In another development on Wednesday, the Houthis fired a Qaher 1 ballistic missile at the al-Faisal military base in Saudi Arabia’s southwestern city of Khamis Mushait in retaliation for Riyadh’s unrelenting military campaign against Yemen.

Separately, several soldiers loyal to embattled Yemeni president, Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi, were killed after Yemeni troops fired a missile at the Dhubab district of Tai’zz.

Meanwhile, Saudi bomber aircrafts pounded Yemen’s northern province of Sa’ada, killing five civilians and wounding six others.

Saudi Arabia started its military aggression against Yemen in late March in a bid to bring Hadi back to power.

To curb the increasing violence, a seven-day ceasefire under the United Nations’ auspices was agreed in Yemen, which went into effect on December 15, but was repeatedly violated.

Saudi Arabia’s attacks against Yemen have so far claimed the lives of more than 7,500 people and injured over 14,000 others.

Half of Yemen ‘one step away’ from famine: UN

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Food insecurity at “emergency” levels in 10 of Yemen’s 22 governorates, World Food Programme says.

The UN says 14.4 million people of the country's 23 million are food insecure [EPA]

The UN says 14.4 million people of the country’s 23 million are food insecure [EPA]

by Al Jazeera

The United Nations food agency has warned that food supplies in Yemen are deteriorating quickly and the country is at risk of slipping into famine.

Ten out of Yemen’s 22 governorates were now classified as facing food insecurity at “emergency” levels, which is one step below famine, the World Food Programme (WFP) said on Friday.

“Clearly, Yemen is one of the hardest place in the world today to work – massive security concerns, escalation in the fighting, and the violence across the country,” Matthew Hollingworth, WFP’s deputy regional director, said in the capital, Sanaa.

“We are doing well, we are improving our reach and getting to more people every month, but clearly with half of the country now just one step away from famine, we need the international community to really come behind us and support us, particularly over the next few months,” he added.

According to the UN’s 2016 Humanitarian Needs Overview in November, 14.4 million people of the country’s 23 million are food insecure, struggling to get enough food to live a healthy life.

That includes 7.6 million people in desperate need of food assistance.

“It’s a country that cannot take any further shock,” Abeer Etefa, the WFP’s spokesperson for the Middle East region, told Al Jazeera.

“It’s a very serious situation. We are doing our best so that we don’t see a deterioration of the situation that’s already extremely compromised.”

‘People have nothing’

Since March, an Arab coalition led by Saudi Arabia has conducted air strikes in Yemen in an effort to curb the expansion of the country’s Houthi rebels, who have fought government forces for control of the country.

The conflict has sparked a massive humanitarian crisis. More than 1.5 million people have been displaced, and many more are struggling to access the basic necessities, including food, water and fuel.

Battles have been going on for weeks in and around Taiz as forces loyal to President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi – supported by coalition air strikes – clash with Iran-backed Houthi rebels for control of the strategically located city, seen as a gateway between south Yemen and the capital.

The UN says more than 5,700 people have been killed in the country since then, nearly half of them civilians.
“I appeal to all people of good will. Look at these displaced people. They are your brothers from Yemen. You must look at them and consider them. Help them with anything, food, clothes, mattresses,” a displaced Yemeni, Mohamed Ahmed Hassan, told the Reuters news agency.

“People here have nothing. They don’t even have anything to sleep on. They sleep on the ground,” Hassan said.

Saudi-led coalition ‘deliberately’ targeting hospitals in Yemen: ICRC

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With a stockpile of Western arms, the Saudi siege of Yemen has hit nearly 100 healthcare facilities in war-torn country since March

Al-Thawra hospital in southern Yemen was bombed on Sunday. (Photo: AP)

Al-Thawra hospital in southern Yemen was bombed on Sunday. (Photo: AP)

by Nadia Prupis, Common Dreams

The Saudi Arabia-led coalition in Yemen has repeatedly targeted and attacked hospitals and clinics, an appalling trend that “disrespects the neutrality of health facilities” in war, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said Tuesday.

The U.S.-backed coalition has bombed nearly 100 hospitals throughout Yemen since March, with the most recent airstrike hitting a clinic on Sunday in the southern city of Taiz—one the country’s most populous regions, which has been under heavy fire for months. The shelling of Al-Thawra hospital in the south came just weeks after a Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) clinic was hit in Haydan, in the north.

“Al-Thawra hospital, one of the main health care facilities in Taiz which is providing treatment for about 50 injured people every day was reportedly shelled several times on Sunday. The shelling endangered the lives of patients and staff on site,” Kedir Awol Omar, the deputy head of the ICRC delegation in Yemen, said on Tuesday. “The neutrality of healthcare facilities and staff is not being respected. Health facilities are deliberately attacked and surgical and medical supplies are also being blocked from reaching hospitals in areas under siege.”

Airstrikes on medical clinics are “a flagrant violation of international humanitarian law,” ICRC said.

MSF also said on Tuesday that it has been unable to deliver essential medical aid to two hospitals stationed in a particular volatile corner of Taiz, where almost half of health facilities face an influx of wounded patients along with a scarcity in supplies.

“A large part of the population of Taiz is displaced within the city,” said Karline Kleijer, MSF’s emergency manager for Yemen. “They are battling for their survival on a daily basis, and fighting to get hold of sufficient food and water, due to the steep cost of basic necessities and the prevailing insecurity.”

“The situation in Taiz is dramatic and will only get worse in the coming weeks if no efforts are made to spare civilians from the violence and allow them to access basic services, including health facilities,” Kleijer said.

Saudi officials have not responded to the most recent bombing, but they denied being aware that the October airstrikes in Haydan had targeted a clinic.

“Saudi authorities are denying the evident truth of having destroyed a hospital,” said Laurent Sury, head of MSF emergency operations. “This is an alarming sign for the Yemeni people and for those trying to assist them. How are we to draw lessons from what happened when all we face are denials? How can we continue to work without any form of commitment that civilian structures will be spared?”

Amnesty International in October demanded an independent investigation of the bombing in Haydan, which it said could amount to a war crime. Further, the humanitarian aid group noted that while the planes that dropped the shells were Saudi, the bombs themselves were American.

“The USA and other states exporting weapons to any of the parties to the Yemen conflict have a responsibility to ensure that the arms transfers they authorize are not facilitating serious violations of international humanitarian law,” said Donatella Rovera, Amnesty’s senior crisis response adviser. “Lack of accountability has contributed to the worsening crisis and unless perpetrators believe they will be brought to justice for their crimes, civilians will continue to suffer the consequences.”

“The world’s indifference to the suffering of Yemeni civilians in this conflict is shocking,” Rovera said.

Meanwhile, MSF’s Kleijer on Sunday published testimony from her most recent visit to Taiz, describing the devastating impacts of the siege by warring factions and the unrelenting intervention of military forces.

“A lot of airstrikes happen at night,” Kleijer wrote. “Lying in your bed, you hear the planes circling above the city, then you hear the whistle of a bomb falling, and then you brace yourself for the impact. You hope it’s not your building that going to be hit. And then it hits another building, not your house, so as well as being frightened, you’re also relieved.”

“The noise of the airstrikes is so loud and intense that you can actually feel it in your bones,” Kleijer wrote. “This is what people have been going through every night, for months on end…everything is touched by the war: the children have a game called ‘One two three airstrike’ in which they all fling themselves to the ground.”

MSF hospital in Yemen Bombed by US-backed coalition

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Active medical facility was struck while patients and staff were inside

Images from Doctors Without Borders hospital in Saada following Monday night's bombing. (Photo: MSF Yemen/Twitter)

Images from Doctors Without Borders hospital in Saada following Monday night’s bombing. (Photo: MSF Yemen/Twitter)

by Sarah Lazare, Common Dreams

Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières confirmed Tuesday afternoon that one of its small hospitals, located in the Haydan district in Saada Province, “was hit by several airstrikes beginning at 10:30 p.m. last night.”

“Hospital staff and two patients managed to escape before subsequent airstrikes occurred over a two-hour period,” the organization said in a statement. “One staff member was slightly injured while escaping. With the hospital destroyed, at least 200,000 people now have no access to lifesaving medical care.”

Hassan Boucenine, MSF head of mission in Yemen, denounced the attack as “another illustration of a complete disregard for civilians in Yemen, where bombings have become a daily routine.”

A Doctors Without Borders/Médecins sans Frontières (MSF) hospital in northern Yemenwas bombed Monday night by the Saudi Arabia-led military coalition.

Tim Shenk, press officer for MSF, confirmed to Common Dreams that the active medical facility, based in the Saada governorate, has been hit. The strike was initially reported by the aid agency’s Yemen bureau, which noted that there were several patients and staff members in the facility at the time of the attack.

“Our hospital in the Heedan district of Saada governorate was hit several times. Fortunately, the first hit damaged the operations theater while it was empty and the staff were busy with people in the emergency room. They just had time to run off as another missile hit the maternity ward,” MSF country director Hassan Boucenine told Reuters.

“It could be a mistake, but the fact of the matter is it’s a war crime. There’s no reason to target a hospital,” Boucenine continued. “We provided (the coalition) with all of our GPS coordinates about two weeks ago.”

The bureau also released images of the facility following the bombing:

This is not the first such attack. Since the Saudi-led and U.S.-backed military campaign began over six months ago, the coalition has bombed medical facilities, markets, schools, power plants, refugee camps, factories, and warehouses storing humanitarian supplies. In addition, the Saudi-led naval blockade has left 80 percent of Yemen’s population in dire need of food, water, and medical assistance, according to aid agencies.

The World Health Organization estimates that the conflict has so far killed roughly 5,600 people, the majority of them civilian. According to a recent report by Action On Armed Violence and the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, in 2015, 93 percent of people killed or wounded in populated areas as a result of “air-launched explosive weapons” were civilians.

The Saudi-led coalition is responsible for the vast majority of these killings. The office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights reported last month that “almost two-thirds of reported civilian deaths had allegedly been caused by coalition airstrikes, which were also responsible for almost two-thirds of damaged or destroyed civilian public buildings.”

Monday’s bombing comes just over three weeks after the U.S. military bombed a functioning MSF hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan, killing at least 30 people.

Drone Papers ‘no surprise to Yemenis,’ says man who lost family

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“For years, we have been confused by the sharp contrast between what we see with our own eyes and what the U.S. government tells the world,” said Faisal bin Ali Jaber.

"For years, we have been confused by the sharp contrast between what we see with our own eyes and what the U.S. government tells the world. Slowly, the whole truth will come out," said Faisal bin Ali Jaber. (Photo: Reprieve)

“For years, we have been confused by the sharp contrast between what we see with our own eyes and what the U.S. government tells the world. Slowly, the whole truth will come out,” said Faisal bin Ali Jaber. (Photo: Reprieve)

by Sarah Lazare, Common Dreams

One man who lost family members to the covert U.S. drone war in Yemen responded Friday to The Intercept‘s explosive new exposé of the American “assassination complex” by proclaiming he is not surprised but now more hopeful “the whole truth will come out.”

“I read that the Americans have very little knowledge of the innocent civilians they are killing in Yemen,” said Faisal bin Ali Jaber, a Yemeni engineer whose nephew Waleed bin Ali Jaber and brother-in-law Salem bin Ali Jaber were killed in a 2012 U.S. drone strike attack on their village of Khashamir.

“This is no surprise to Yemenis,” he continued. “For years, we have been confused by the sharp contrast between what we see with our own eyes and what the U.S. government tells the world. Slowly, the whole truth will come out.”

“I hope that my American court case will help that happen. But how many innocent Yemeni men, women and children will die before it does?” Jaber added, referencing his months-long court battle for justice or, short of that, acknowledgment of his loss. The administration of President Barack Obama earlier this month rejected a settlement offer that would have required a formal apology for the drone strike that killed Jaber’s family.

Joe Pace, an attorney for the legal charity Reprieve who represents Jaber, said: “We were told that the drone program was ‘safe’ and ‘effective.’ When we raised concerns with the Administration that it was anything but, we were told ‘trust us.'”

“These leaked reports confirming the staggering inaccuracy of the U.S drone program may be news to the American people who have been lied to by this Administration, but there’s nothing revelatory for [Jaber] or the millions who live under constant threat of U.S. drone strikes,” Pace continued. “[Jaber] and countless others have witnessed their loved ones literally blown to pieces based on a toxic combination of garbage intelligence and U.S. indifference to foreign lives.”

Deadly air strike reported on Yemen wedding party

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Arab coalition yet to respond to charge it carried out attack in Sanban in second such incident in just over a week.

un-us-yemen-drones

by Al Jazeera

A suspected air strike has killed at least 13 people at a wedding party in a town in Yemen, witnesses say, even as UN peace efforts make headway.

Medical sources said 38 people were wounded, besides the dead, in Wednesday’s incident in Dhamar province.

There was no immediate comment from the Arab coalition, which has been conducting a bombing campaign against the Iran-allied Shia Houthi fighters and their allies in Yemen since March.

The alleged raid hit a house where dozens of people were celebrating the wedding in Sanban, 100km south of the capital Sanaa, residents said.

The incident is the second alleged coalition strike on a wedding party in the Arabian Peninsula country in just over a week.

“Coalition warplanes launched the attack. The house was completely destroyed,” Taha al-Zuba, a witness and local resident, said.

“Warplanes were heard in the area ahead of the attack.”

The Houthi-affiliated Al Masirah television said on Twitter that the wedding was hit by “aggression warplanes”, referring to the coalition assembled by Saudi Arabia.

In September, a suspected coalition strike killed at least 131 civilians at a wedding near the Red Sea city of al-Mokha, which the UN said may have been the deadliest hit since March.

The coalition denied involvement.

Peace efforts

The air strike in Sanban comes as the UN announced that the Houthis, who control Sanaa and much of central and northern Yemen, had accepted a Security Council resolution calling for an end to the conflict.

The Houthis’ refusal to agree to abide by the resolution passed in April – demanding their withdrawal from all the territory they have seized since they overran Sanaa in September last year – had blocked previous peace efforts.

Yemeni President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi, who fled into exile in neighbouring Saudi Arabia in March but whose forces have since recaptured much of the south with the support of coalition ground troops, had refused to join UN-brokered peace talks until the Houthis signed up.

But Stephane Dujarric, UN spokesman, announced in New York late on Wednesday that both the Houthis and their allies had confirmed they were willing to enter talks based on the UN resolution.

“This is an important step,” he said.

The Houthi fighters, whose heartland is in the mountains of the far north, were only able to capture so much of the country because of the support of renegade troops still loyal to Hadi’s deposed predecessor, Ali Abullah Saleh.

Saleh’s General People’s Congress party too announced on Wednesday that it had accepted the UN peace plan following secret talks with Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed, the UN envoy for Yemen.

Ould Cheikh Ahmed “believes that the government of Yemen, the Houthis and their allies should accept the invitation to join peace talks on this basis”, Dujarric said on Wednesday.

Arab coalition accused of war crimes in Yemen

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Amnesty International seeks halt to arms transfers to coalition members, citing evidence of “unlawful air strikes”.

The Houthi stronghold of Saada has been hit hard during the conflict [File: Reuters]

The Houthi stronghold of Saada has been hit hard during the conflict [File: Reuters]

by Al Jazeera

Amnesty International has accused the Arab coalition fighting in Yemen of carrying out unlawful air strikes, some of which amount to war crimes.

The UK-based rights group on Wednesday called for the suspension of transfers of certain arms to members of the coalition, which launched an air campaign against Houthi rebels in March.

Amnesty said in a report that it had examined 13 deadly air strikes by the coalition, assembled by Saudi Arabia, that had killed about 100 civilians, including 59 children.

“This report uncovers yet more evidence of unlawful air strikes carried out by the Saudi Arabia-led coalition, some of which amount to war crimes. It demonstrates in harrowing detail how crucial it is to stop arms being used to commit serious violations of this kind,” said Amnesty’s Donatella Rovera, who headed the group’s fact-finding mission to Yemen.

“The USA and other states exporting weapons to any of the parties to the Yemen conflict have a responsibility to ensure that the arms transfers they authorise are not facilitating serious violations of international humanitarian law.”

Bahrain, Egypt, Jordan, Kuwait, Morocco, Qatar, Sudan and the United Arab Emirates are participating in the coalition.

Cluster bombs

Amnesty said its researchers had found remnants of two types of internationally banned cluster bombs as it investigated attacks on Saada, a Houthi stronghold in northeastern Yemen.

Another rights watchdog, Human Rights Watch, in August accused Saudi forces of using cluster bombs in Yemen.

The claim was then denied by a spokesman for the coalition.

Amnesty also said cases had been documented of civilians who were not directly participating in hostilities but were killed or injured while asleep or carrying out their daily activities.

It said that in at least four of the air strikes investigated, “Homes attacked were struck more than once, suggesting that they had been the intended targets despite no evidence they were being used for military purposes.”

Another Amnesty report, published in August, condemned both sides in the conflict over the killing of civilians.

Yemen’s war pits the Houthis and troops loyal to former President Ali Abdullah Saleh against forces fighting on the side of exiled President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi.

The Arab coalition is seeking to reinstate Hadi and his government.

More than 2,300 civilians have been killed in the conflict since March, the UN Human Rights office said late September.

Pro-Houthi forces have been accused of indiscriminately shelling populated areas in violation of the laws of war, killing civilians.

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