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Suicide bombing kills 13 in Yemen's Aden

Xinhua, February 17, 2016 Adjust font size:

About 13 soldiers were killed and several others injured when a suicide bomber blew himself up at a military camp in Yemen's southern port city of Aden on Wednesday, a security official told Xinhua.

"A suicide bomber detonated his explosives belt at the main gate of Ras Abbas military base in Aden's western district of Buraiga, where scores of new army recruits were present for training," the local security source said on condition of anonymity.

The suicide bombing resulted in the killing of 13 people, mostly soldiers and new recruits, and injuring several others at the scene, the source added.

Nearly 50 soldiers were critically injured, according to a medical official.

Witnesses confirmed to Xinhua that a huge explosion rocked the oil-rich district of Buraiga in Aden and plumes of black smokes can be seen rising from the area.

Ambulances rushed to evacuate the injured soldiers to a nearby military hospital for treatment while police forces traced the attackers, according to local sources.

The port city of Aden, Yemen's temporary capital, has been witnessing a state of chaos and lawlessness during the past weeks wihch resulted in the assassination of Aden's former governor, several high-ranking security officers and judges.

The turbulent and complicated security situation in Aden and neighboring southern provinces of Lahj and Abyan is one of the biggest challenges for the Saudi-led Arab coalition forces operating in Aden.

The Saudi-led Arab coalition has dispatched thousands of soldiers from Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Sudan and Bahrain into five anti-Houthi southern provinces to support and train local Yemeni security forces there.

Yemen, an impoverished Arab country, has been gripped by one of the most active regional al-Qaida insurgencies in the Middle East and the affiliate of the Islamic State.

The security situation in the country has deteriorated since last March when war broke out between the Shiite Houthi group, supported by former President Ali Abdullash Saleh, and the government backed by a Saudi-led Arab coalition. Endit