Twenty-six people have died after an Arab coalition air strike which hit a house in a residential area in western Yemen, while separately a senior al-Qaeda leader was killed by a US drone strike in the war-torn country.
Warplanes of the Saudi-led alliance launched missiles on Wednesday at a residential neighbourhood in the Red Sea port city of Hodeidah where Houthi leaders were staying, a resident and medical workers in the Houthi-controlled area told Reuters.
The raid hit a house in a neighbourhood populated by workers, according to medical services and local officials. Apart from those killed, 60 others were wounded, they said.
The coalition, which began operations in Yemen in March last year to try to reverse the rise to power of the Iran-allied Houthi group, has repeatedly said it does not target civilians.
In a statement, the coalition said it was aware of reports alleging civilian casualties in Hodeidah city.
The deputy governor of Hodeidah province, Hashim Azazi, had earlier put the death toll at 19 civilians, but said rescue workers were still pulling victims out of the rubble.
Separately a senior leader of Yemen's al-Qaeda branch has been killed in a US drone strike in central Yemen, an official of the exiled government of President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi said.
The official said Abdallah al-Sanaani, a regional commander in al-Qaeda in Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), was killed along with his bodyguard while travelling in a vehicle in the al-Sawma'a district of Abyan province.
"He was killed, along with an escort, and the vehicle was completely burned," the official, who asked not to be named, told Reuters.
The United States has been using drones to target the Islamist militant group, which has exploited Yemen's civil war to carve out a foothold in the impoverished country.
US officials have said AQAP is one of the most potent security threats in the Middle East.
The group, whose attacks have mainly targeted the Yemeni government and the Iran-allied Houthi group, claimed responsibility for an attack last year on the Paris office of the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo.
