Yemeni army carries out 71 operations against Houthi positions in country’s southwest

The Yemeni army announced on Saturday that it had carried out 71 operations targeting Houthi positions in Yemen’s southwestern province of Taiz, Anadolu reports.

“Our armed forces carried out 71 precise targeting operations against combat gatherings, military buildups, and reinforcements belonging to the terrorist Houthi militia” in Taiz, army spokesman Col. Majed Abdullah al-Nuzaili said in a statement on US social media company X.

Al-Nuzaili said the operations focused on the areas of al-Aqrood, Sama’, al-Ahkum, al-Akboush, Jabal Rasin, Jabal Jardad, Bani Omar, Bani Bakari, al-Kaawash, and al-Athawir.

The operations “resulted in the destruction of a number of hostile transport and support vehicles, the neutralization of militia members, and the stripping of their formations of the ability to continue fighting,” he added, without specifying the number of casualties.

The Houthi group did not comment on the statement.

The developments come amid a military escalation in Taiz Governorate between government forces and the Houthi group.

READ: Yemeni army says 30 Houthis killed, 50 wounded in clashes south of Taiz

On Friday, six civilians, including two children and a woman, were injured in Houthi artillery shelling that targeted residential neighborhoods in central Taiz, according to Yemen’s state-run news agency Saba.

Also on Friday, the Yemeni army announced that heavy clashes had broken out with the Houthis on the northern front of the city of Taiz, without providing further details.

The army also said it launched dozens of airstrikes against Houthi movements, reinforcements, gatherings, and positions in several areas of the governorate.

Meanwhile, Yemen’s Interior Ministry announced the death of Mohammed al-Khawlani, chief of staff of the ministry’s Emergency Forces Brigade, during clashes with the Houthis on the al-Kadha front in Taiz.

The ongoing clashes are part of a military escalation that began in July, the most extensive since the relative calm that followed the April 2022 truce.

READ: Around 79,000 children displaced in western Yemen in less than a month: UNICEF