At least 70 pro-government soldiers were killed on Saturday in a Houthi rebel missile fire against their camp mosque in Marib province east of Sanaa, Yemen, doctors and military officials said on Sunday.
The dead and wounded were taken to hospital in the town of Marib, the capital of the province of the same name. The death toll was confirmed by pro-government military officials who claimed that the attack was launched by the Houthis. President Abd Rabbo Mansour Hadi also accused the Houthis of being responsible for the attack, which he described as "cowardly and terrorist", according to the official Saba agency.
The mosque targeted by a drone
The government of President Hadi, recognized by the international community and supported by a military coalition led by Saudi Arabia, has been at war with the rebels since 2014 when they took the capital Sanaa and much of northern Yemen. The attack targeted a military camp in the province of Marib located 170 km east of the capital, according to a military source.
The mosque was targeted by a missile and then by a drone, said the source. "This shameful action by the Houthi militia confirms that the latter has no peaceful intention, that it only wants death and destruction and that it is the instrument of Iran in the region", underlined President Hadi.
The Houthis did not claim responsibility for the attack. According to various humanitarian organizations, the conflict has killed tens of thousands of people, mainly civilians, since Ryad's intervention in 2015 at the head of the coalition. About 3.3 million people are still displaced and 24.1 million, more than two-thirds of the population, are in need of assistance, according to the UN, which has regularly described the conflict in Yemen as the worst current humanitarian crisis in the world.
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