5 Sudanese soldiers killed in Yemen

Five Sudanese soldiers have been killed while fighting for the Saudi-led coalition against Houthi forces in Yemen, a spokesman for Sudan’s armed forces (SAF) revealed yesterday.

The SAF spokesperson, Brigadier General Ahmed Khalifa Al-Shami, confirmed the deaths but did not specify where the operations took place or when the soldiers were killed.

We lost five martyrs and 22 others have been wounded… we inflicted huge losses on the enemy and are holding many prisoners of war.

Without offering further details, he said Sudanese forces had completed their “first stage of duty” in Yemen and were now preparing to launch the second stage. Yesterday’s statement is the second time Sudan has announced casualties in Yemen. In January 2016, Sudan’s defence ministry confirmed that a soldier had died in Aden.

Sudan has deployed hundreds of soldiers in the coalition fighting rebels allied with former President Ali Abdullah Saleh. Since 2015 the Saudi-led military coalition has been backing the government of President Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi after he was ousted from the capital Sana’a by the Houthis.  The coalition also comprises: Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates along with Egypt, Jordan and Morocco.

The United Nations says the fighting has left around 7,700 people dead, 42,500 wounded and displaced more than three million people. The UN has warned more than 7.3 million of Yemen’s population of around 18.8 million are estimated to be close to starvation and 462,000 children suffer from serious malnutrition. Without $2.1 billion in international aid, the UN warns that Yemen will suffer a major famine this year.