Riyadh, Saudi Arabia —
Two Saudi military personnel have been killed in an attack in Yemen, Saudi state media said Saturday, reporting that the assailant was affiliated with Yemen’s defense ministry.
“An officer and a non-commissioned officer were martyred, and an officer was injured as a result of a treacherous and cowardly attack” Friday inside a military camp in the city of Seiyun, the official Saudi Press Agency (SPA) said, citing defense ministry spokesperson Brigadier General Turki al-Maliki.
Saudi Arabia mobilized an international coalition to intervene in Yemen to support the internationally recognized government in 2015, after Iran-backed Houthi rebels seized the capital Sanaa the previous year.
Seiyun is in the governorate of Hadhramout, which falls under the control of the internationally recognized government.
The coalition forces stationed in the camp where the attack took place were helping train local forces to combat terrorism and smuggling, SPA said.
The attack took place during athletics training, it said, without elaborating on how it was carried out or providing details of the assailant’s identity or position.
A Yemeni officer told AFP that the incident began with a verbal altercation between the Yemeni perpetrator and the Saudis, which led to an exchange of gunfire.
SPA said that the perpetrator “does not represent the honorable members of the Yemeni Ministry of Defense who appreciate the positive and important role played by the coalition forces” to back the government.
The bodies of the dead and the wounded officer have been transported to Saudi Arabia, SPA said.
“The joint forces will work in coordination with the Yemeni Ministry of Defense to follow up on the investigation procedures to find out the reasons and motives and arrest the perpetrator and bring him to justice,” the report said.
The war in Yemen has killed hundreds of thousands either in fighting or from indirect causes such as a lack of food, the United Nations says.
Hostilities fell off considerably in April 2022, when a six-month, U.N.-brokered truce came into effect, and they have remained at a low level since.
