SANAA: Yemen’s Huthi rebels warned on Saturday they could launch attacks against the capitals of Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, who lead a military coalition against them.
The threat came as the United Nations was trying to salvage a truce deal in Yemen, seen as crucial to diplomatic efforts to end the country’s four-year war.
"We have aerial photographs and coordinates of dozens of headquarters, facilities and military bases of the enemy," rebel military spokesman Yahya Saree said in comments carried by the rebels’ Al-Masirah channel. "The legitimate targets of our forces extend to the capital of Saudi Arabia and to the emirate of Abu Dhabi," capital of the UAE, he said.
"We have manufactured advanced generations of attack aircraft, and new systems will soon be functional."
The Iran-linked Huthi rebels have targeted Saudi border towns and Riyadh with ballistic missiles and also claimed drone attacks on the airports of Abu Dhabi and Dubai during the course of the conflict
Saudi Arabia has said the missiles were all intercepted by its air force, with one civilian reported killed by falling shrapnel, while the UAE has denied the alleged drone attacks.
Saudi Arabia and its military allies joined the Yemeni government’s war against the Iran-linked Huthis in March 2015, triggering what the UN calls the world’s worst humanitarian crisis. Some 10 million Yemenis face mass starvation, according to the UN.
Both sides to the conflict stand accused of acts that could amount to war crimes. The World Health Organization estimates nearly 10,000 people have been killed in Yemen since March 2015, when Saudi Arabia and its allies joined the government’s war against the Huthis.
Other rights groups estimate the toll could be much higher.
On Wednesday the UN Security Council met to discuss the stalled truce deal that had been agreed in Sweden in December between the Saudi-backed Yemeni government and the Huthis.
The deal -- which called for a ceasefire, rebel pullback and mutual redeployment from Hodeida, Yemen’s lifeline Red Sea port controlled by the Huthis -- offered the best hope in years of moving toward an end to the conflict.
While the fighting in Hodeida has eased, redeployment efforts have stalled in recent weeks.
UN envoy Martin Griffiths told the Security Council on Wednesday he was still working to make the redeployment a "reality".Yemen's army says the country's air defence has managed to shoot down 19 Saudi Apache helicopters since the outbreak of the war in 2015. Speaking at a press conference in Sana, army spokesman Brigadier Yahya Sare'e provided the figures regarding the four-year-long war on the impoverished Arab country.
He said that Saudi Arabia and its allies have carried out over 250,000 airstrikes and dropped more than 500,000 bombs and missiles on Yemen, al-Masirah TV reported.
The aggressors’ warplanes fired at least 5914 cluster and phosphorus bombs at several Yemeni provinces, he added. Sare'e also noted that a total of 22 countries have directly and indirectly been involved in the Saudi war, adding that Yemen is in possession of evidence suggesting Israel's role in the Western-backed offensive.
The spokesman further said that the Yemeni army has boosted its capability to manufacture weapons and stored ballistic missiles at its depots. The Yemeni military, he stressed, has managed to destroy over 7,000 armored vehicles, trucks, tanks and bulldozers belonging to the Saudi-led coalition.
Saudi Arabia and its regional allies, including the UAE, launched the devastating military campaign against Yemen in order to bring the Riyadh-backed former government back to power. The invaders have, however, failed to achieve their objective in the face of Yemenis’ resistance.
The war has so far taken a heavy toll on the Yemen’s infrastructure, hospitals, schools, and factories. According to a report by the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project (ACLED), a nonprofit conflict-research organization, the Saudi war has claimed the lives of around 56,000 Yemenis.
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