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Yemen's Houthis seize central Aden district, presidential site

03 April 2015 00:11 (UTC +04:00)

Baku-APA. Yemeni Houthi fighters and their allies seized a central Aden district on Thursday, striking a heavy blow against the Saudi-led coalition which has waged a week of air strikes to try to stem advances by the Iran-allied Shi'ite group, APA reports quoting Reuters.

Hours after the Houthis took over Aden's central Crater neighborhood, they marked another symbolic victory by fighting their way into a presidential residence overlooking the neighborhood, residents said.

The southern city has been the last major holdout of fighters loyal to the Saudi-backed President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi, who fled Aden a week ago and has watched from Riyadh as the vestiges of his authority have crumbled.

By nightfall the Iran-allied Shi'ite fighters had reached the edge of Aden's port district of Mualla, they said.

The Houthis and their supporters swept into the heart of Aden despite an eight-day air campaign led by Riyadh trying to stem their advances and ultimately return Hadi to power.

By midday on Thursday they were in control of Crater neighborhood, deploying tanks and foot patrols through its otherwise empty streets after heavy fighting in the morning.

It was the first time fighting on the ground had reached so deeply into central Aden. Crater is home to the local branch of Yemen's central bank and many commercial businesses.

"People are afraid and terrified by the bombardment," one resident, Farouq Abdu, told Reuters by telephone from Crater. "No one is on the streets - it's like a curfew".

Hadi loyalists had few heavy weapons to halt the Houthi advance, although the remains of one smoldering tank in Crater showed they had put up a staunch defense in some places.

Aden residents reported three air strikes against a Houthi position north of Crater on Thursday, and a fourth at the presidential residence shortly after they took control of it.

Another resident said Houthi snipers deployed on a mountain overlooking Crater and fired on the streets below. Several houses caught fire after being struck by rockets, and messages relayed on loudspeakers urged residents to move out to safer parts of the city, he said.

After the advance in Crater, unidentified armed men disembarked from a vessel off Mualla. A port official said they were armed guards from a Chinese warship taking evacuees from the city. Yemeni and Saudi officials said there was no coalition ground operation in Aden.

China's Xinhua news agency said a Chinese missile frigate evacuated 225 people, all non-Chinese nationals, from Aden on Thursday to Djibouti.