Manama: The Saudi-led coalition fighting in Yemen intercepted and destroyed drones targeting the Saudi Arabian border city of Asir on Monday, state news agency SPA said citing the coalition’s spokesman.
The coalition’s spokesman, Colonel Turki al-Malki, said in a statement that the drones were launched by Yemen’s Iran-aligned Houthi group and deliberately targeting civilians and civilian facilities with an aim to cause huge casualties.
He added that the coalition was taking appropriate measures to protect the Kingdom's citizens and will take rigorous measures against the militia, SPA reported.
The Asir region shares a short border with the Saada Governorate of Yemen. Earlier in the day, the Arab coalition forces intercepted and shot down a bomb-laden unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) launched by the Houthi militia targeting the southwestern city of Khamis Mushayt.
The continuation of these hostile and terrorist acts using explosive-laden drone’s to target civilians is a blatant violation of the International Humanitarian Law and its rejection of all the initiatives offered by the coalition, he said.
The Joint Forces Command of the Coalition will continue to apply rigorous measures to neutralize and destroy such capabilities and to protect innocent civilians from these terrorist acts, Colonel Al-Maliki added.
The latest attacks came just two days after the coalition shot down a Houthi missile, which targeted the border city of Najran, on Saturday morning, launched from the Yemeni governorate of Saada.
Some civilians were slightly injured by fragments of the missile when it was destroyed.
The Saudi-led military coalition intervened in Yemen in March 2015 to try to restore the internationally recognised government of President Abd Rabbu Mansour Hadi to the capital in Sanaa, after it was overthrew from the capital by the Houthis in late 2014.
Meanwhile, the Organization of Islamic Cooperation strongly condemned Houthi drone attacks on civilians in Saudi Arabia.
