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Update: 2 terrorist attacks leave 49 killed in southern Yemen

Xinhua, May 23, 2016 Adjust font size:

The death toll of two terrorist attacks that targeted army recruits and a military brigade on Monday morning in Yemen's southern port city of Aden reached 49 killed and several others injured, Yemeni officials told Xinhua.

The suicide attack targeted the newly-trained soldiers inside the 39th Armored Brigade in Aden's district of KhorMaksar, leaving about 25 soldiers killed and 23 others at the scene.

The official spokesman for Aden's local government told Xinhua that "a suicide bomber sneaked into the army brigade and detonated his explosive belt among dozens of soldiers."

At the same time, a car bomb exploded as recruits lined up for meeting a military committee in KhorMaksar district in order to enlist for military service. It is not yet clear how many people killed and injured in the car bomb explosion.

The car bomb explosion left about 24 killed and and a number of others injured at the bombing site, according to the local military sources.

After the two separate bombings, security authorities in Aden received intelligence information about a car filled with explosives in Aden prepared to launch a fresh attack in the city.

No group has yet claimed responsibility for the latest suicide bombings, although the Yemen-based al-Qaida offshoot is believed to be behind most such attacks in the past, which usually targeted security and government officials.

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

The Yemen-based al-Qaida offshoot, also known as Ansar al-Sharia, emerged in January 2009. It had claimed responsibility for a number of attacks on Yemen's army and government institutions.

It took advantage of the current security vacuum and the ongoing civil war to expand its influence in Yemen's southern regions.

The fragile security situation in Yemen has deteriorated since March 2015, when a war broke out between the Shiite Houthi group, supported by former President Ali Abdullash Saleh, and the government backed by a Saudi-led coalition.

More than 6,000 people have been killed in ground battles and airstrikes since then, half of them civilians. Endit