Heavy Yemeni troop losess reported in attack

Heavy fighting in south of country causes high casualty counts on both sides as army takes on al-Qaeda fighters.

Scores of government soldiers and al-Qaeda-linked fighters have died in clashes in southern Yemen, according to medical and military officials.

Officials on Monday raised the casualty count since fighting began on Sunday in Abyan province to at least 85 Yemeni soldiers and 25 al-Qaeda fighters.

According to the AP news agency, 106 people are reported dead on both sides, while  55 troops have been taken prisoner.

A military official, speaking to the AFP news agency, said dozens more Yemeni soldiers had been injured in surprise attacks on army posts on the outskirts of Zinjibar, Abyan’s provincial capital, and described the clashes as a “massacre”.

A health official in the military hospital in the southern port city of Aden, speaking on condition of anonymity, said “the death toll… has risen to at least 103” soldiers.

He said “many soldiers died from wounds sustained in the assault” on army posts in the Zinjibar outskirts.

The official said the fighting was taking place west of Zinjibar. Al Qaeda-linked fighters seized control of the town in May, taking advantage of political turmoil linked to the uprising against former Yemeni president Ali Abdullah Saleh.

Latest battle

The battle is the latest in a spate of attacks against security forces since President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi took over from Saleh on February 25 under a Gulf Cooperation Council brokered transition accord.

On the day Hadi was sworn in, vowing to carry on Saleh’s fight against al-Qaeda in the south, a suicide bomber blew up his vehicle outside a presidential palace in the southeastern province of Hadramawt killing 26 soldiers.

Late on Saturday, hours after a similar suicide attack killed a soldier in southwest Yemen, suspected al-Qaeda gunmen shot dead a police officer in Hadramawt.

Separately on Sunday, Abdullah Idris, the head of Saleh’s General People’s Congress party branch in Rada, a town southeast of Sanaa, was “seriously” wounded when his car exploded, a military official said.

His two companions were also wounded in the blast in Rada, which al-Qaeda briefly captured in mid-January, the same source said.