Airstrikes killed seven separatist fighters in Yemen on Friday, an official with the group said, as a Saudi-led coalition hit back against a sweeping advance by the UAE-backed Southern Transition Council and Abu Dhabi called for calm.

The deaths are the first from coalition fire since the secessionist STC seized swathes of Hadramawt and Mahra provinces last month. Other strikes hit the airport and military base in Hadramawt’s Seiyun city on Friday, an STC source and witnesses said.

A military spokesman for the STC said it was in a “decisive and existential” war with Saudi-backed Yemeni forces, characterizing it as a fight against radical Islamism — a longtime preoccupation of the UAE.

Saudi Arabia and the UAE have for years supported rival factions in Yemen’s government-run territories, but the STC’s offensive has angered Riyadh and left the oil-rich Gulf powers at loggerheads.

The UAE said after the strikes on Friday that it sought de-escalation and that its last forces had left Yemen.

“The UAE concluded the presence of its counterterrorism forces,” a government official said, adding Abu Dhabi “remains committed to dialogue, de-escalation and internationally supported processes as the only sustainable path to peace.”

Mohammed Abdulmalik, head of the STC in Wadi Hadramaut and Hadramaut Desert, said seven airstrikes earlier hit the Al-Khasha camp, killing seven and wounding more than 20.

Further strikes targeted other sites in the same region, he........

© The Times of Israel