IS suicide bomber kills six in Aden

A suicide bomber on a motorcycle killed six southern separatist fighters yesterday on the outskirts of the Yemeni city of Aden, the site of a surge of violence that had complicated the near five-year-old war and undermined peace efforts.

Daesh claimed responsibility for the assault on the patrol from the Security Belt group, part of a separatist front fighting Yemeni government forces for control of the city, the extremist group’s Amaq news agency said.

The separatists and the government are both part of an Arab coalition battling the Iran-aligned Houthis, which took over most of Yemen’s cities in 2014.

Meanwhile, Lise Grande, Humanitarian Coordinator for Yemen, said the country’s humanitarian operation “is in deep trouble” because pledges made at an international conference this past February “haven’t materialised”.

“We’ve already been forced to close vaccination and health programmes and scale-back on protection services for the victims of sexual and gender-based violence,” she detailed.

“If donors don’t honour the promises they’ve made, 22 major programmes will close in coming weeks”. It has long been said that Yemen is the world’s worst humanitarian crisis.