Yemeni army troops, backed by fighters from allied Popular Committees, have targeted a military parade and gatherings of Riyadh's mercenaries in Yemen’s central province of Ma'rib with a new domestically-manufactured missile.
Brigadier General Yahya Saree, the spokesman for the Yemeni Armed Forces, told Yemen’s Arabic-language al-Masirah news website that Yemeni missile defense units successfully hit the targets in Mas camp with a Nakal missile on Monday.
Saree said the attack came after a precision intelligence operation, where forces loyal to the regime in Riyadh were preparing a military escalation towards Nihm and Sarwah front lines.
It is the first time the Yemeni army has unveiled the locally-designed Nakal missile, whose detailed specifications have not been announced yet.
Yemeni forces, also backed by Houthi fighters, regularly target positions held by Saudi-led forces both in Yemen and inside Saudi Arabia in retaliation for assaults by a coalition led by the Arab kingdom, which started its campaign against Yemen in March 2015 in an attempt to reinstall a former regime and eliminate the Houthi Ansarullah movement, which has been defending the country along with the armed forces.
The US-based Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project (ACLED), a nonprofit conflict-research organization, estimates that the Saudi-led war has claimed the lives of over 60,000 Yemenis since January 2016.
The campaign has also taken a heavy toll on Yemen’s infrastructure, destroying hospitals, schools, and factories. The United Nations has warned that more than 24 million Yemenis are in dire need of humanitarian aid, including 10 million suffering from extreme levels of hunger.