Saudi commander, UAE officer killed in Yemen fighting

A top Saudi commander and an Emirati officer were killed Monday during Arab coalition operations against Iran-backed rebels in Yemen, the Riyadh-led alliance announced in a statement.

Saudi Colonel Abdullah al-Sahyan and Emirati officer Sultan al-Kitbi were killed at dawn on Monday "while they were carrying out their duties in supervising operations to liberate Taez" province in Yemen's southwest, the official SPA news agency said.

A Yemeni officer told AFP that both officers were killed when rebels fired a rocket at a coastal road in the strategic province, which overlooks the Bab al-Mandab Strait between the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden.

A Saudi-led coalition has been battling Iran-backed rebels in Yemen since March, and has provided loyalist forces with troops and equipment as well as carrying out air strikes on insurgent positions. 

Sahyan on Saturday met Yemeni President Abedrabbo Mansour Hadi who awarded him with a medal of courage, according to Yemen's official sabanews.net website.

He was identified as commander of the Saudi forces in provisional capital Aden, where Hadi is based.

The United Arab Emirates, playing a key role in the Saudi-led coalition, confirmed the death of its officer without specifying his rank.

In early September, a similar rebel missile strike on a coalition base in Yemen's eastern Marib province killed 67 coalition soldiers, most of them Emiratis.

So far at least 80 people, mostly soldiers and border guards, have been killed in Saudi Arabia because of the Yemen conflict.

The UAE says it has lost almost 70 soldiers so far.

Several Bahraini troops and one Qatari soldier have been killed as part of the coalition operations. 

In Yemen itself, the United Nations says more than 5,800 people have been killed, about half of them civilians, and more than 27,000 wounded since March.

File photo AFP