ADEN // Five people were killed and 17 injured in a suicide bombing in Marib city on Friday, while a prison chief and his bodyguard were shot dead in Aden.

The bombing targeted a central market selling qat at midday, when it was crowded with civilians, said Ahmed Rabie, a journalist based in Marib.

“The injured people were taken to Marib hospital,” Rabie said. Several had suffered serious injuries, he told The National, citing hospital sources.

There was no claim of responsibility, but Al Qaeda and ISIL have claimed such attacks in the past. Yemen’s Houthi rebels usually target civilians with shelling.

Abdullah Abu Sa’ad, another journalist in Marib, said the bombing came a day after a group of women were arrested with explosives in the city.

“The security forces arrested the women in a house with some landmines and bombs,” Abu Sa’ad said. They are suspected of being a Houthi sleeper cell, he added, citing security sources.

In Aden, gunmen killed the acting manager of Al Mansoura central prison in the latest attack on security officials in the city.

Senior warrant officer Wahad Awn was shot at noon while leaving his mother’s house with his bodyguard, said Abdurrahman Al Naqeeb, the spokesman for Aden’s police office.

“The killers fled by car,” he added.

Al Mansoura district had been occupied by Al Qaeda militants until they were driven out at the end of March by Yemeni troops backed by forces of the Saudi-led coalition that is helping Yemen’s government re-establish control in the country.

The United States said on Friday it had killed 10 Al Qaeda operatives in four strikes in Yemen since April 23. A Pentagon spokesman also said the US was providing intelligence and a limited number of personnel to UAE forces, who are playing a leading role in the coalition.

The coalition and government forces have been targeting the extremists in southern Yemen in recent weeks, forcing them to withdraw from several cities.

Separately, a short video posted on Yemeni news sites on Friday showed a kidnapped Tunisian Red Cross worker pleading for the Yemeni and French governments to help free her.

Nourane Hawas was abducted by unidentified gunmen in the rebel-held capital Sanaa in December.

In the video, Ms Hawas, wearing a black veil, does not indicate her location or the identity and demands of her kidnappers.

foreign.desk@thenational.ae

* With additional reporting by Agence France-Presse and Reuters