Landmine blast kills 4 Yemeni civilians

ADEN, Yemen -- An explosion caused by a landmine killed four civilians, including a child in the country's southeastern province of Shabwa on Saturday, a government official told Xinhua.

According to the local government source who asked to remain anonymous, "a landmine exploded under a civilian vehicle while it was passing on a road in Bayhan district of Shabwa province."

He confirmed that the landmine explosion killed four civilians, one of them a child, and injured others at the scene.

All the victims belonged to one tribal family and worked as farmers in the agricultural area, he said.

He added that the area had been heavily planted by landmines of the Houthi rebel group before the arrival of the government forces in 2017.

Civilian casualties are seen almost daily in Yemen as a result of the landmines that were planted in large numbers and in different parts of the war-ravaged Arab country.

Previous reports by humanitarian organizations said that Yemen has become one of the largest landmine battlefields in the world since World War II.

The Iran-allied Houthi rebels seized the northern provinces including the capital Sanaa in late 2014, forcing Yemen's President Abdu-Rabbu Mansour Hadi and his government into exile.

A coalition formed by Saudi Arabia and several other Arab countries intervened militarily in the Yemeni conflict to fight against the Houthis in March 2015, in response to an official request from Hadi to protect Yemen and roll back Iran's influence.