Wanted Houthi leader killed in coalition raid
riyadh — The administrative chief of Houthicontrolled northern Yemen was killed in a Saudiled coalition air raid last week, Houthi-run tele- vision reported on Monday.
Saleh Al Samad was the most senior Houthi official to be killed by the coalition since it intervened in Yemen’s civil war in 2015 to try and push back the Houthis.
The Houthis’ Al Masirah TV said Al Samad was killed on Thursday in Hodeidah province. Al Samad was second on the coalition’s most wanted list of Houthi leaders, after the group’s leader Abdel-Malek Al Houthi.
The coalition had offered a $20 million reward for any information that led to Al Samad’s capture, according to Saudiowned broadcaster Al Arabiya TV. —
riyadh — Yemen’s armed Houthi movement fired two ballistic missiles at a Saudi Aramco facility in the southern city of Jizan on Monday, but Saudi state media said both projectiles were destroyed. The Houthis’ Al Masirah TV said they had targeted a port belonging to the Saudi state oil giant.
The Saudi state news agency quoted the spokesman for the Saudi-led coalition that intervened against the Houthis in Yemen’s war in 2015 as saying the two missiles were intercepted over Jizan and their debris fell on residential neighbourhoods.
“There were no casualties or damages recorded as of the time of (our) statement,” Colonel Turki Al Maliki said. Aramco did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The company is building a 400,000-barrel-per-day refinery in Jizan, part of a new economic city on the Red Sea, and it is expected to become fully operational in 2019. —