RIYADH: The Saudi-led coalition launched an air raid on Saturday on a cave in the Yemeni capital Sanaa, used by Houthi rebels to stockpile drones, a spokesman said.

The cave near the presidential palace in Houthi-held Sanaa contained drones to be used in “terrorist operations”, Colonel Turki al-Maliki said.

The “military target, a cave used by the terrorist Houthi militia to stockpile drones was destroyed,” he said, in a statement carried by the official Saudi Press Agency.

Earlier this month, the coalition said that Saudi air defence intercepted two drones launched by Houthi rebels from Yemen that targeted Khamis Mushait, home to a major airbase in the southwest of the kingdom.

And in January the Houthis launched a drone attack on Yemen’s largest airbase, Al-Anad, north of the southern port of Aden, during a military parade.

Eleven people were wounded in the attack, including Yemen’s deputy chief of staff Major General Saleh al-Zandani who later died of his injuries.

Seven other loyalists — including a high-ranking intelligence official — were killed in the attack.

Yemen is mired in a grinding conflict between the Iran-aligned Houthi rebels and a government backed up by a Saudi-led coalition.

Published in Dawn, April 21st, 2019