US-British strikes leave 16 dead in Yemen, Houthi TV says

DUBAI (Reuters) -The Houthi’s Al-Masirah television said on Friday 16 people had been killed and 35 wounded in U.S. and British strikes on Yemen’s Hodeidah province.

The outlet reported that the strikes targeted a radio building in Hodeidah’s Al-Hawk district and port of Salif.

The U.S. and British militaries said they launched strikes against Houthi targets in Yemen on Thursday as part of efforts to deter the militant group from further disrupting shipping in the Red Sea.

The U.S. Central Command said in a statement that U.S. and British forces had hit 13 targets in Houthi-controlled areas of Yemen.

The British defence ministry said the joint operation targeted three locations in the Red Sea port city of Hodeidah, which it said housed drones and surface-to-air weapons.

“As ever, the utmost care was taken in planning the strikes to minimise any risk to civilians or non-military infrastructure,” the British defence ministry said in a statement.

“Conducting the strikes in the hours of darkness should also have mitigated yet further any such risks.”

Houthi spokesperson Mohamed Abdelsalam said the strikes constituted a “brutal aggression” against Yemen as “punishment” for its position in support of Gaza.

In Tehran, Houthi-allied Iran condemned the strikes as “violations of Yemen’s sovereignty and territorial integrity…, international laws and human rights”, Iranian state media reported.

“The aggressor U.S. and British governments are responsible for the consequences of these crimes against the Yemeni people,” Iranian foreign ministry spokesperson Nasser Kanaani said in a statement.

The Houthis, who control Yemen’s capital and most populous areas, have attacked international shipping in the Red Sea since November in solidarity with the Palestinians in the war between Israel and Hamas militants, drawing U.S. and British retaliatory strikes since February.

(Reporting by Hatem Maher, Mohammed Ghobari and Clauda Tanios; additional reporting by Dubai newsroom; Editing by Chris Reese, Bill Berkrot, Christian Schmollinger and Philippa Fletcher)