UAE-backed senior Yemen officer dies in Abyan

A Yemeni military source yesterday said that a senior officer with the UAE-backed Southern Transitional Council (STC)’s troops has died during battles with government forces in Yemen’s southern province of Abyan province.

The source told Anadolu Agency that the officer was identified as Ali Saif Al-Halemi, adding that he had died during clashes between the STC forces and the government troops in Abyan’s Zinjibar district.

The STC has not commented on the news yet.

Yemen’s southern provinces have witnessed repeated clashes between government forces and STC fighters since the latter declared self-rule in Aden late April.

Yemen has been devastated by a conflict that escalated in March 2015 after the Houthis seized the capital Sanaa and forced the President Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi to flee and invited a Saudi-led coalition to intervene militarily to reverse Houthi gains.

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