Senior Yemeni army commander killed

SANAA: A senior commander of Yemeni government troops was killed on Wednesday while fighting rebels.

Major General Ahmed al Yafi, the deputy chief of the staff linked to the government, was killed in fierce clashes with the rebels in the Yemeni coastal city of Mokha, government military and rebels confirmed.

Al Yafi was killed after rebels fired a rocket at him, Saudi-owned broadcaster Al Arabiya reported.

Rebel television Al Masirah praised Al Yafi’s killing.

President Abedrabbo Mansour Hadi on Wednesday mourned the slain general’s death and said that the rebels would be ultimately routed.

“Students and colleagues of General al Yafi will humiliate the noses of criminal militias in the dust,” Hadi said in a statement, according to Yemen’s official news agency Saba.

Last month, government troops, backed by the air alliance, launched a massive offensive to retake Mokha from rebels.

Mokha is strategically important because it is located near the Bab alMandab Strait, a waterway connecting the Red Sea with the Indian Ocean through which many of the world’s oil shipments pass.

President Hadi said on Wednesday that Saudi Arabia has earmarked $10 billion in aid for the reconstruction of provinces retaken from the rebels.

Hadi said the neighbouring kingdom had allocated $10 billion “for the reconstruction of liberated provinces, including $2 billion as a deposit in the central bank to shore up the (Yemeni) riyal”, the Saba news agency reported.