A recent report has revealed that Yemeni army soldiers and fighters from allied Popular Committees killed and injured dozens of Saudi soldiers in the kingdom’s southwestern border regions in December last year as part of their retaliatory raids against the Riyadh regime’s aerial bombardment campaign.
Yemen’s official Saba news agency reported on Thursday that Yemeni forces and their allies fatally shot 25 troopers in the regions of Jizan, Najran and Asir last month.
Another 12 also sustained injuries in retaliatory attacks.
Also on Thursday, Yemeni soldiers and Popular Committees fighters targeted a military vehicle belonging to Saudi-backed militiamen loyal to Yemen's former president Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi in the Khabb and Sha'af district of Yemen’s northern province of al-Jawf, killing all on board.
Yemeni snipers shoot dead three Sudanese soldiers in Jizan
Meanwhile, at least three Saudi-paid Sudanese soldiers have lost their lives when Yemeni army troops and fighters from allied Popular Committees launched an attack in Jizan.
A military source, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the Saudi mercenaries were in the Midi Desert of the region, located 966 kilometers south of the Saudi capital Riyadh, on Wednesday evening.
In November, the spokesman for Yemen's Houthi Ansarullah movement, Mohammed Abdul-Salam, referred to the deaths of several Sudanese mercenaries in Hudaydah, saying they were “victims of their government being on the payroll in a cruel and senseless war.”
“With all respect for the Sudanese nation, we hope the Sudanese regime will change its position regarding its participation in the aggression against Yemen. The Sudanese government will achieve nothing but defeat and destruction from this futile war,” he added.
Abdul-Salam warned that Yemen would turn into a “graveyard” for invaders.
Saudi Arabia and a number of its regional allies launched a devastating military campaign against Yemen in March 2015, with the aim of bringing the government of Hadi back to power and crushing the Ansarullah movement.
According to a new report by the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project (ACLED), a nonprofit conflict-research organization, the Saudi-led war has so far claimed the lives of around 56,000 Yemenis.
The Saudi-led war has also taken a heavy toll on the country’s infrastructure, destroying hospitals, schools, and factories. The UN has already said that a record 22.2 million Yemenis are in dire need of food, including 8.4 million threatened by severe hunger. According to the world body, Yemen is suffering from the most severe famine in more than 100 years.
A number of Western countries, the US and Britain in particular, are also accused of being complicit in the ongoing aggression as they supply the Riyadh regime with advanced weapons and military equipment as well as logistical and intelligence assistance.