Several Saudi forces have been killed and dozens more wounded as Yemeni drones launched attacks on Saudi military positions in the kingdom’s Asir region.

An unnamed Yemeni military source told Arabic-language al-Masirah television network that Yemeni soldiers and their allies attacked a gathering of Saudi troops in al-Rabu'ah town of the region on Sunday, using a domestically-designed and -manufactured Qasef K2 (Striker K2) combat drone. 

The source added that several Saudi soldiers were killed in the aerial assault, and dozens of others sustained injuries.

Separately, scores of Saudi-sponsored militiamen loyal to Yemen's former president, Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi, have been killed and injured when Yemeni soldiers and their allies struck their strongholds in the al-Wazi’iyah and Hayfan districts of the southwestern Yemeni province of Ta'izz.

Saudi Arabia and a number of its regional allies launched a devastating campaign against Yemen in March 2015, with the goal of bringing the government of Hadi back to power and crushing the Houthi Ansarullah movement.

According to a December 2018 report by the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project (ACLED), a nonprofit conflict-research organization, the Saudi-led war has claimed the lives of over 60,000 Yemenis since January 2016.

The war has also taken a heavy toll on the country’s infrastructure, destroying hospitals, schools, and factories. The UN said in a report in December 2018 that over 24 million Yemenis are in dire need of humanitarian aid, including 10 million suffering from extreme levels of hunger.


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