SANAA, Dec 5: A suicide bomber rammed an explosives-packed car into Yemen’s defence ministry complex on Thursday, allowing gunmen to launch an assault which killed 25 people including three foreign doctors, officials said.

The brazen attack on the sprawling facility follows a spate of hit-and-run strikes on military personnel and officials, as the country struggles to complete a thorny political transition.

The attacks in the capital and in the south have generally been blamed on Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), which Washington regards as the jihadist network’s most dangerous branch.

“At least 25 people have been killed,” a security official said shortly after the defence ministry had put the death toll at 20.

Six doctors, including a Venezuelan and two from the Philippines, and three Yemenis, along with five patients including a judge, were among the dead, medical sources said.

They were at a hospital within the ministry’s complex, and which bore the brunt of the attack.

“A car bomb driven by a suicide bomber forced its way into the western entrance of the ministry complex,” a security official said.

“It was followed by another car whose occupants opened fire at the complex of buildings,” he said.—AFP