Yemen - Civil War

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Saudi defense minister orders aid delivery to Yemen

Saudi Deputy Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman ordered the delivery of cargo planes carrying humanitarian goods to Yemen’s southern city of Aden. (SPA)

By Staff writer | Al Arabiya News
Thursday, 23 July 2015

Saudi Deputy Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman - who is also the kingdom's defense minister - ordered the delivery of cargo planes carrying humanitarian goods to Yemen’s government-held southern city of Aden, Al Arabiya News Channel reported on Thursday.

The deputy crown prince issued the order following directions from King Salman bin Abdulaziz.

Meanwhile, a second Saudi military plane loaded with 20 tonnes of humanitarian aid arrived in the newly-reopened airport of Aden on Thursday, according to Al Arabiya’s correspondent.

On Wednesday, a Saudi aircraft landed in Aden becoming the first plane to reach the port city in four months.

The delivery planes belong to the Royal Saudi Air Force.

They aim at bringing much-needed relief to Yemeni citizens who have been suffering from the violations of the Iranian-backed Houthi militias.

Some 12.9 million people in Yemen are either "food insecure" or "severely food insecure," according to World Food Program (WFP) estimates.

Last Update: Thursday, 23 July 2015 KSA 18:27 - GMT 15:27
http://english.alarabiya.net/en/News/middle-east/2015/07/23/Saudi-Defense-Minister-orders-delivery-of-aid-planes-to-Yemen-.html

 

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Yemeni Popular Resistance forces tighten Aden grip

Southern Resistance fighters flash the victory sign at the international airport of Yemen's southern port city of Aden. (Reuters)

By Staff writer | Al Arabiya News
Monday, 20 July 2015

Forces loyal to Yemeni President Abdrabbu Mansour Hadi tightened their grip on the southern city of Aden after parts of Tawahi district, Al Arabiya News channel reported Sunday.

The Popular Resistance took control of state institutions in the district and targeted the last stronghold belonging to the Iranian-backed Houthi militias.

Tawahi houses state institutions including the presidential palace, state security offices and the main port.

The latest advances in Aden come only a day after pro-Hadi forces had announced the seizure of Al-Anad Triangle located in Lahj province, about 50 km (30 miles) north of Aden, as part of an offensive dubbed "Operation Golden Arrow."

Operation Golden Arrow, the biggest government fight back against the Iran-backed Houthis, comes four months after the militias entered the port city of Aden.

The Popular Resistance also said it had captured the Labuza army base in Lahj and the headquarters of the 117th armored division in eastern Shabwa province some 230km (145 miles) away.


Last Update: Monday, 20 July 2015 KSA 07:27 - GMT 04:27
http://english.alarabiya.net/en/News/middle-east/2015/07/20/Pro-Hadi-forces-tighten-grip-on-Aden-s-al-Tawahi-.html

 

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Saudi, UAE forces deployed to Yemen
Jeremy Binnie, London - IHS Jane's Defence Weekly
21 July 2015

Like the member of the RSLF Paratroopers and Special Forces seen here during Exercise 'Red Alligator 4' in November 2014, the foreign soldiers spotted in Aden carried AK-103 rifles. Source: Saudi Press Agency

Saudi Arabia's Al-Watan newspaper cited unidentified sources on 17 July as saying that Saudi special forces soldiers had arrived in Aden to guard officials from Yemen's internationally recognised government who had arrived in the city after a series of victories by pro-government forces.

It said the unit consisted of 50 men, including officers, and had accompanied Yemeni officials who returned to their country from exile in Riyadh.

The report was corroborated by photographs that emerged on social media showing well-equipped foreign soldiers escorting Yemeni dignitaries around Aden. The soldiers carried AK-103 assault rifles, a Kalashnikov type used by the Royal Saudi Land Forces (RSLF) Paratroopers and Special Forces.

A Saudi source told IHS Jane's that the soldiers are from the RSLF's 64th Airborne Brigade.

The presence of United Arab Emirates (UAE) soldiers inside Yemen seems also to have been confirmed. According to the official news agency, WAM, the country's General Command of the Armed Forces announced on 16 July that Lieutenant Abdulaziz Sarhan Saleh al-Kaabi had been killed while participating in Operation 'Restoring Hope', the name for the Saudi-led military intervention against Yemen's Ansar Allah group.

The death of a second soldier participating in 'Restoring Hope', Saif Yusuf Ahmed al-Falasi, an NCO of unspecified rank, was announced on 21 July.

While no further details on either fatality were provided, WAM also reported the minister of transport in Yemen's exiled government as saying that the UAE had deployed a specialist team to Aden to re-open the port city's airport.

Aden International Airport was captured by forces fighting against Ansar Allah on behalf of the internationally recognised government on 14 July in an operation that involved newly arrived Oshkosh M-ATVs, a type of armoured vehicle that is used by both Emirati and Saudi special forces and has not previously been seen in Yemen.

While these vehicles are in service with both RSLF and UAE special forces, the ones seen in Yemen were operated by men in civilian clothes.
Saudi, UAE forces deployed to Yemen - IHS Jane's 360

 

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Emirati plane brings aid to Yemen’s Aden

Workers unload aid shipment from a Saudi military cargo plane at the international airport of Yemen's southern port city of Aden July 23, 2015. (AP)

AFP, Aden
Friday, 24 July 2015

An Emirati plane landed in Aden at dawn on Friday, bringing humanitarian aid to the southern Yemeni city only hours after its airport came under rocket fire from rebels.

The aircraft is the third to land in the port city since the symbolic reopening of the airport on Wednesday, after nearly four months of fierce fighting.

It delivered medical supplies from the Red Cross and United Arab Emirates before departing, an airport official said.

A vital supply artery for war-torn south Yemen, the facility came under fire from the Shiite Houthi militia on Thursday as a Saudi plane was unloading humanitarian aid on the tarmac.

Overnight, rocket attacks on Aden killed three people and wounded 57, according to al-Khader Laswar, a health official in the city.

The rockets were fired from north Aden, where the Houthi militia still have a presence after being driven out of most of the city by fighters loyal to exiled President Abedrabbu Mansour Hadi.

The Saudi-led military coalition that backs Hadi carried out air strikes on Houthi positions in the area during the night, said a tribal source.

Elsewhere, coalition warplanes struck rebel positions in Omran, north of the rebel-held capital Sanaa, and Dhamar in central Yemen, according to residents.

Last Update: Friday, 24 July 2015 KSA 12:28 - GMT 09:28

http://english.alarabiya.net/en/News/middle-east/2015/07/24/Emirati-plane-brings-aid-to-Yemen-s-Aden-.html

 

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2 #Saudi & 1 #UAE airplanes landed today in #Aden airport loaded with humanitarian aids & equipment to help operating the airport -@AlHadath

 

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For the 2nd time, RSAF C-130 (1624) with humanitarian aids has landed at Aden. It was escorted by UAEAF Mirage 2000.

 

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Huthies' ammo store:

 

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Evidence Grows of Saudi-led Forces in Yemen
By Awad Mustafa 6:44 a.m. EDT July 24, 2015

(Photo: Stringer/AFP)

ABU DHABI — Evidence of Saudi-led coalition land forces operating in Yemen has been mounting since the initiation of Operation Golden Arrow to recapture the city of Aden on July 16.

Although no official confirmation from the coalition was provided, a coalition official has told Defense News that 600 servicemen and trained Yemeni fighters were deployed to recapture the port city.

"We are supporting the legitimate corps in the Yemeni armed forces militarily, logistically and with humanitarian aid and we are supplying them with materials and information," Brig. Gen. Ahmed Al-Assiri, spokesman for the Saudi-led coalition told Al-Arabiya television in an interview on July 22. "However I will not be able to explain on what types of support or involvement as operations are still ongoing," he added.

Since operations began, the coalition official said, Saudi Arabia has deployed 45 mine-resistant ambush- protected Oshkosh M-ATVs, while the United Arab Emirates has deployed 50 Emirati-made Nimr four-wheel-drive multipurpose armored vehicles as well as 25 Emirati-made Enigma eight-wheel-drive infantry fighting vehicles.

This is the first deployment of the 8x8 Enigma as the vehicle was first unveiled at the Abu Dhabi International Defence Exhibition in February.

The vehicle, produced by Abu Dhabi-based Emirates Defense Technology, was set to undergo trials this summer with the UAE armed forces, company CEO Mohamed Al Suwaidi told Defense News during IDEX 2015.

The vehicle, Al Suwaidi said, was designed based on rigid UAE armed forces requirements to fulfill tasks including being able to carry BAE Systems' variant of the M777 howitzer artillery gun.

"We want to build this vehicle specially for our military, especially for their requirements and build it exactly around what they want, as opposed to something off the shelf being built by someone," Al Suwaidi said.

A team from the UAE also arrived in Aden to reopen the airport on July 20.

Yemen's transport minister, Badr Mubarak Ba-Salma, said that a specialist technical team arrived to reopen the airport and that contractors would be brought in to work on the airport.

The UAE also registered two combat casualties in one week, on July 16 and 21.

According to a statement released on July 16 by the UAE armed forces, a UAE serviceman died while "performing his national duty" with Saudi-led coalition forces.

"Lt. Abdul Aziz Sarhan Saleh Al Ka'abi was killed while participating in Operation Restoring Hope, in support of the internationally-recognised Yemen government of President Abdrabu Mansur Hadi, said the UAE General Command of the Armed Forces," the statement read

On July 21 another casualty was announced and tributes poured in from throughout the country for the third Emirati soldier to die in Operation Restoring Hope. In June, a non-commissioned UAE officer identified as Hazim Obaid Al Ali had died.

The third serviceman was only identified as Saif Youssef Ahmed Al Falasi, 35, and was stated to have been killed in combat in Yemen.

According to Aleksander Jovovic, principal at Avascent, a Washington-based aerospace and defense consultancy, in a "typical" counterinsurgency air campaign, some presence on or near the battlefield is highly beneficial.

"Forward air controllers, the most prominent role, ensure effective targeting. Beyond that, mirroring the US engagement against ISIL in Iraq, other ground presence may include air traffic control at active airports or airfields, and military trainers and advisers — sometimes accomplished by special forces units," Jovovic explained.

"With the increasing scope of foreign equipment in theater, coalition maintenance and support personnel may also be involved, as is the case with logistics experts that are involved in resupply or coordinating the humanitarian effort," he added.
Evidence Grows of Saudi-led Forces in Yemen

 

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RAF Bombs Diverted to Saudis for Yemen Strikes
By Andrew Chuter 12:04 p.m. EDT July 16, 2015

(Photo: SAC Scott Ferguson, CROWN COPYRIGHT)

LONDON — Britain is transferring Paveway IV precision guided bombs originally earmarked for the Royal Air Force to Saudi Arabia to enable the Gulf state to build stocks of the weapon being used against targets in Yemen and Syria, sources here said.

The Ministry of Defence has swapped delivery positions on the production line at Raytheon UK to ensure the Saudi Royal Air Force has weapon stocks to continue strike missions with the highly accurate 500-pound bomb.

The RAF will receive Paveway IVs coming off the production line at a later date to replace the diverted weapons, said a source familiar with the situation.

The air forces of both nations use the precision guided bomb on BAE Systems-supplied Tornado and Typhoon jets, making stocks easily interchangeable.

The Saudis have been using the weapon for strike missions against Islamic State targets and against Houthi rebels in Yemen.

Saudi Arabia and other Arab states have been bombing the Houthis since the end of March as part of an effort to reinstate Yemen's President Abd-Rabbu Mansour who has been ousted by the rebel group.

Sources in the gulf region reported during the IDEX exhibition in Abu Dhabi in February the Saudis had been the first to drop Paveway IVs in anger from its Typhoon jets when it struck an Islamic State target soon after the weapon had been cleared for service on the combat aircraft.

Redirection of the weapons to the Saudis came to light after the MoD responded to a written House of Lords question regarding the amount of assistance Britain had given the Riyadh government in its fight against Houthi rebels in Yemen.

"We are not participating directly in Saudi-led military operations in Yemen, but we are providing technical support, precision-guided weapons and exchanging information with the Saudi Arabian armed forces through pre-existing arrangements," the MoD said in its response July 14.

A Ministry of Defence spokesman declined to comment beyond the answer given to the parliamentarian.

Raytheon UK announced it had secured its first export contract for the Paveway IV in April 2014 but never named the customer.

The sale had been held up for several years after the US State Department declined to sanction the use of US components for unspecified reasons.

The deal was reckoned to be worth about £150 million (US $234.5 million). Raytheon said it involved the delivery of "hundreds of weapons" over a two-year period.

With RAF Tornados also using the weapon against Islamic State targets in Iraq, the source said discussions are underway with Raytheon for a top-up order.

Raytheon's UK and US operations developed Paveway IV for the British with the weapon going into service in 2008.

The British government subsequently placed several orders for the weapon in the wake of the NATO air campaign in Libya, where it was widely used by the RAF.
RAF Bombs Diverted to Saudis for Yemen Strikes

 

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Saudi-led coalition declares 5-day Yemen truce

Saudi military cargo plane is seen at international airport of Yemen’s southern port city of Aden. (Reuters)

AFP, Riyadh
Saturday, 25 July 2015

The Saudi-led coalition that has bombed the militia Houthi group in Yemen since March unilaterally declared a five-day humanitarian truce from Monday to allow aid deliveries, the official Saudi Press Agency reported.

The ceasefire will take effect from midnight on Sunday, a statement on Saturday said, with the coalition reserving the right to respond to “military activity or movement” by the Houthis.

SPA said the decision was taken at the request of Yemen’s President Abedrabbo Mansour Hadi, who has taken refuge in the Saudi capital with much of his government.

Hadi, whose supporters have recaptured most of the southern port of Aden from the Houthi militia after four months of war, wanted the truce for the “delivery and distribution of the maximum amount of humanitarian and medical aid,” it said.

Two previous ceasefires brokered by the United Nations failed to take hold.

Last Update: Saturday, 25 July 2015 KSA 17:32 - GMT 14:32
http://english.alarabiya.net/en/News/middle-east/2015/07/25/Saudi-led-coalition-declares-5-day-Yemen-truce-.html

 

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Yemen Houthi leader captured by Southern resistance

 

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Houthis attack despite coalition truce

Military vehicles of the Southern Resistance fighters move during clashes with Houthi fighters on a street in Yemen's southern port city of Aden. (File photo: Reuters)

By Mohammed Mukhashef and Mohammed Ghobari | Reuters, Aden/Sanaa
Sunday, 26 July 2015

Yemen’s Houthi militias early Monday broke a humanitarian truce less than an hour after it began, Al Arabiya News Channel reported.

The Arab coalition on Saturday announced a ceasefire to take effect at 11.59 p.m. (2059 GMT) on Sunday evening for five days to allow for the delivery of humanitarian aid.

The militias launched an attack on the cities of Taiz, Marib and Lahej shortly after a pre-arranged ceasefire declared by the Saudi-led coalition, the sources added.

Earlier, Yemeni forces allied with a Saudi-led coalition fought Houthi militia for control of the country's largest air base north of Aden on Sunday, residents said.

The al-Anad base, 50 km from the southern port city, has been held by the Iranian-allied Houthi movement for much of a fourth-month-old civil war and commands the approaches to Aden.

The head of the Houthi supreme revolutionary committee, Mohammed Ali al-Houthi, said in comments carried by the Saba news agency that the group was not notified by the United Nations about the ceasefire and would not form a position towards it until then.

"There is no positive or negative stance until the United Nations formally addresses us concerning the matter," he said.

The Iranian-allied Houthi forces held up 16 trucks carrying humanitarian aid from the World Food Program through Yemen's Al Hudaydah province to support displaced persons in the city of Taiz.

Four months of air raids and war have killed more than 3,500 people in the Arabian Peninsula state. Aden has suffered especially, with severe shortages of fuel, food and medicine.

The Arab coalition, allied with southern secessionist fighters, retook much of Aden last week in the first significant ground victory in their campaign to end Houthi control over much of Yemen and restore exiled President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi.

Houthi fighters and army units loyal to former president Ali Abdullah Saleh captured Aden at the outset of the war, prompting Hadi to flee to Saudi Arabia, an ally along with the United States.

Aden and other southern provinces have been largely inaccessible to U.N. food aid, and about 13 million people -- over half the population -- are thought in dire need of food.

Warplanes attack
Coalition warplanes carried out raids near Sanaa late on Saturday and shortly after dawn on Sunday, residents reported. The targets included a military base near the city.

In the city itself, a bomb exploded underneath a passenger bus, killing three people and wounding five in the southern district of Dar Selm, police said. No further details were immediately available.

Ali Ahmedi, a spokesman for anti-Houthi forces in Aden, said they continued to fight Houthi forces at the al-Anad base and had damaged aircraft, tanks and equipment stationed there.

Residents said forces of the so-called Southern Resistance, a secessionist movement allied with the coalition, had taken Sabr, a northern district of Aden. The residents reported 25 Houthis and 10 Southern Resistance fighters had been killed.

The Saudi-led coalition began its campaign on March 26, striving to reverse months of advances by the Houthis after they moved from their northern stronghold last year, capturing the capital Sanaa and pushing south to Aden.

A senior Houthi commander, Abdul-Khaliq al-Houthi, was captured on Saturday by the Southern Resistance, the secessionist movement said on its official Twitter account.

Houthi officials could not immediately be contacted for comment. Reuters could not independently verify the information.

Yemenis say Abdul-Khaliq al-Houthi, a brother of Houthi leader Abdul-Malek al-Houthi, played an important role in the militia's capture of Sanaa in September.

Last Update: Monday, 27 July 2015 KSA 00:48 - GMT 21:48
http://english.alarabiya.net/en/News/middle-east/2015/07/26/Battle-for-Yemen-s-biggest-air-base-heats-up-.html

 

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Emarati BMP-3M in Aden: