40 children killed in Yemen bus strike: new toll

SANAA: Forty children were among 51 people killed in a Mideast coalition air strike on a bus in rebel-held northern Yemen, the Red Cross said Tuesday, after thousands protested at a mass funeral. Fifty-six children were also among the 79 people wounded in the Thursday strike on Saada province, the International Committee of the Red Cross said in a new toll.

The new casualty toll came after a mass funeral was held for many of the dead children on Monday at which thousands vented anger. Mourners raised pictures of the children and shouted slogans against coalition and its ally and key arms supplier, the United States.

The conflict has killed nearly 10,000 people since then — the vast majority of them civilians — and caused what the United Nations has described as the world’s worst humanitarian crisis. The UN Security Council called on Friday for a “credible” investigation into the deadly strike. But it stopped short of demanding an independent inquiry as urged by UN chief Antonio Guterres after past probes failed to lead to any significant reduction in the high civilian death toll from the coalition’s more than three-year bombing campaign.