Baku-APA. Saudi-led air raids drove back rebels in the last stronghold of Yemen's absent president Friday, while Al-Qaeda militants seized a major army base in the southeast, APA reports quoting AFP.
The impoverished Arabian Peninsula state has sunk further into chaos since the coalition spearheaded by Riyadh launched Operation Decisive Storm on March 26 to try to halt the advance by Shiite Huthi rebels.
The turmoil has raised fears that Al-Qaeda will expand its foothold in the deeply tribal country, which borders oil-rich Saudi Arabia and lies near key shipping routes.
On Friday the Sunni extremists captured unopposed the regional army headquarters in Mukalla, capital of the southeastern province of Hadramawt, a military official said.
They now control nearly all of the city, where they stormed a jail and freed 300 inmates a day earlier.
UN aid chief Valerie Amos said Thursday that 519 people had been killed and nearly 1,700 wounded in two weeks of fighting, adding that she was "extremely concerned" for the safety of trapped civilians.
The conflict has sent tensions soaring between Iran and Saudi Arabia, the foremost Shiite and Sunni Muslim powers in the Middle East.
Iran has angrily rejected accusations of arming the rebels, who have allied with military units loyal to former president Ali Abdullah Saleh to seize large parts of Yemen, including the capital Sanaa.
After a night of intense coalition bombardment, rebel forces withdrew from President Abedrabbo Mansour Hadi's palace in Aden, a senior official said.
They had captured the hilltop complex a day earlier in a symbolic blow to Hadi, who had already fled to Saudi Arabia.
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