Death toll from Saudi-led prison bombing rises to 82

CAIRO — The death toll from a Saudi-led coalition air strike that hit a prison run by Yemen’s Houthi rebels has climbed to at least 82 detainees, the rebels and an aid group said Saturday.

Internet access in the Arab world’s poorest country, meanwhile, remained largely down as the coalition continued strikes on the rebel-held capital, Sanaa, and elsewhere.

The strike in the northern Saada province Friday was part of an intense air and ground offensive that marked an escalation in Yemen’s years-long civil war. The conflict pits the internationally recognized government, aided by the Saudi-led coalition, against the Iranianbacked rebels.

The increase in hostilities follows a Houthi claim of a drone and missile attack that struck inside the United Arab Emirates’ capital earlier in the week.

Ahmed Mahat, head of Doctors Without Borders’s mission in Yemen, told the Associated Press his group counted at least 82 dead and more than 265 wounded in the air strike. The Houthis’ media office said rescuers were still searching for survivors and bodies in the rubble of the prison site in Saada on the border with Saudi

Arabia.

Saudi coalition spokesman Brig. Gen. Turki al-Malki said the Houthis hadn’t reported the site as needing protection from air strikes to the U.N. or the International Committee of the Red Cross. He claimed the Houthis’ failure to do so represented the militia’s “usual deceptive approach” in the conflict.

Al-Malki said reports that the coalition targeted the prison were inaccurate and that the coalition would send “facts and details” to the U.N. and the ICRC, according to Saudi state-run television.