Saudi air defences intercept missile fired at Najran

Saudi air defence forces have intercepted the latest in a series of missiles fired at the kingdom’s cities by Houthi militias in Yemen.

The spokesperson for the Saudi coalition fighting in Yemen, colonel Turki al-Maliki, said the attack was launched at 10:16pm on Monday evening from Yemeni territory north of Amran governorate.

It was fired in the direction of the city of Najran “to target civilian and populated areas”, he added.

The missile was intercepted before it hit its target but some fragments landed on residential areas.

No details of casualties were given.

Al-Maliki repeated previous statements accusing Iran of providing missile components to the Houthis.

Air defence forces also intercepted a missile fired towards the city of Jizan on Friday and three others fired towards Riyadh, Jizan and Najran last Wednesday, along with two Houthi drones.

Read: Yemen’s Houthis claim drone attack on Saudi Aramco facility

Read: Saudi intercepts missile over Jizan

In an earlier press conference in Al-Khobar on Monday, the Saudi coalition presented wreckage of one of the drones, claiming it was Iranian in origin.

It said a panel of experts had concluded Iran was supplying the Houthis with Ababil drone craft to conduct surveillance and offensive operations.

The kingdom suffered its first casualty from a missile attack last month, when an Egyptian resident of Riyadh was hit by debris from three missiles targeting the capital as part of a wider attack also aimed at the southern Saudi cities of Najran, Jizan and Khamis Mushait.

Read: UN Security Council condemns Houthi missile attacks on Saudi Arabia

Saudi Arabia and Arab partners including the UAE entered Yemen’s civil war in 2015 to restore the internationally recognised government of President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi after the Houthi movement seized large areas of the country including the capital Sana’a.

In an update on Monday, the Saudi coalition said 119 rockets and 6,6259 projectiles had been fired across the border into the kingdom as of April 16.