Saudi strike force arrives on Yemen border

Saudi Arabia announced on Monday that a strike force had arrived on the border with Yemen as a Houthi militia bombardment killed a Pakistani man and wounded four in the Saudi city of Najran.

The latest fatality brings to 11 the death toll in Saudi Arabia since Houthis began firing rockets and mortar rounds over the border last week, according to the civil defense department.

Civil defence spokesman Ali al-Shahrani told Saudi news channel Al-Ekhbariya that a school and a residential area in Najran came under fire at 7:00 a.m. (0400 GMT).

Earlier on Sunday, Saudi King Salman bin Abdulaziz said the Saudi-led air war in Yemen was launched to foil a plot by a “sectarian group” to undermine security in the region.

The Saudi monarch was defending the military operation Riyadh has led against Yemeni militia since March 26, in an address read to clerics on his behalf by an adviser in the Muslim holy city of Makkah.

Meanwhile, Yemen’s deposed president Ali Abdullah Saleh Monday declared his support for Houthi militias after raids from the Saudi-led coalition on his house in Sanaa.

“I was not an ally of Ansar Allah [the Houthis ] but today I am announcing from this place that Yemenis will be supportive of anyone who defends the nation’s resources,” the deposed leader said