Four car bombs rock Yemeni capital, Islamic State claim responsibility

Militant group Islamic State in Yemen claimed responsibility for car bomb attacks in the capital Sanaa that killed and injured dozens of people yesterday, according to a statement posted online.

“The soldiers of the Islamic State in Yemen, in a wave of military operations as revenge for the Muslims against the Houthi apostates (detonated) four car bombs near the centres of Houthi apostasy,” the statement from the group said.

The bombs hit three mosques and the political headquarters of the Houthi movement in the Yemeni capital.

The blasts came as Saudi- led forces conducted more air strikes against Houthi military sites across Yemen and as delegates attending peace talks in Switzerland reported no progress on the second day of a UN-sponsored push for a Ramadan truce.

Earlier on Wednesday Houthi fighters in central Yemen blew up the home of a senior politician, Abdel-Aziz Jubari, while he was attending the Geneva talks as a member of the exiled government’s delegation.

Residents of Dhamar city said Houthis militants, who had taken over Jubari’s house in April, dynamited the building early in the morning. Yemeni websites published picture of its collapsed ceiling on top of a pile of rubble.

Shocked at bombing

Jubari, who is deputy head of the delegation sent to Geneva by ousted president Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi, said he was shocked when he heard the news.

“Of course my house is not the only house in Yemen,” he told Reuters in Geneva. “A lot of people’s homes and properties have been targeted in an unbelievable way.”

Houthi was not immediately available to comment.

Houthis seized the Yemeni capital Sanaa in September and pressed into the country’s centre and south, forcing Hadi and his government into exile in Riyadh.

Meanwhile, al-Qaeda militants in Yemen killed two alleged Saudi spies yesterday, residents said, accusing them of planting tracking devices which enabled the assassination of the group’s leader in a suspected US drone strike last week. –(Reuters)