A fourth Bahraini soldier has died from his injuries following an attack earlier this week by Yemeni Houthi rebel target forces patrolling Saudi Arabia’s southern border.
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — A fourth Bahraini soldier has died from injuries suffered in an attack by Yemen’s Houthi rebel targeting forces patrolling Saudi Arabia’s southern border earlier this week, the island kingdom announced late Friday. did.
The state-run Bahrain News Agency, citing a military statement, said the slain soldier was Lieutenant Hamad Khalifa Al Qubaisi.
Mr. Al-Kubaisi “died last Monday from injuries sustained as a result of an act of Houthi aggression while performing a sacred and patriotic mission to protect Saudi Arabia’s southern border,” the statement said.
Yemen’s Iranian-backed Houthi rebels did not claim the attack. Monday’s attack also injured scores of soldiers and threatened recent progress toward ending Saudi Arabia’s eight-year war against the Houthis.
The Saudi-led military coalition said it had “the right to respond at the appropriate time and place.” However, such a response has yet to emerge as efforts move forward to reach a peace agreement to end the war. Saudi Arabia also sought to blame Houthi “elements” rather than the rebel power structure as a whole.
Yemen’s war began in 2014 when the Houthis swept away from their strongholds in the north and captured the capital Sanaa and much of the north. A Saudi-led coalition intervened in 2015 to try to restore the internationally recognized government to power.
The fighting quickly escalated into a deadlocked proxy war between Saudi Arabia and Iran, spreading famine and misery in Yemen, already the Arab world’s poorest country before the conflict. The war killed more than 150,000 people, including combatants and civilians, and caused one of the world’s worst humanitarian disasters, killing tens of thousands more.
Saudi Arabia and Iran restored diplomatic relations earlier this year in a deal brokered by China. Earlier this month, Saudi Arabia welcomed a Houthi peace negotiation delegation, saying the talks had yielded “positive results.”
A U.N.-brokered ceasefire has largely halted the violence, and Yemen has seen only sporadic clashes since it expired about a year ago.