Saudi Arabia Holds Funeral For Soldiers Killed On Border

Saudi Arabia on Saturday held a funeral for four soldiers who were killed on the country's joint border with neighboring Yemen, Saudi media has reported.



The official Saudi news agency said special prayers were held for the four soldiers in their home towns.



It did not clarify, however, the circumstances or the time of killing the soldiers.



Earlier on Saturday, a spokesman for a Saudi-led coalition against the Yemeni Shiite Houthi group said that clashes took place on Friday between Saudi ground troops and Houthi militants on the Saudi-Yemeni border.



Ahmed al-Asiri said one Saudi soldier was killed and two others lightly wounded during the clashes.



Nevertheless, it is not known whether the soldier killed on Friday was one of the four taken to their last resting places on Saturday.



The four new fatalities bring to ten the total death toll among Saudi troops since the beginning of the anti-Houthi attacks on March 25 .



Riyadh says the campaign is in response to appeals by embattled Yemeni President ABD Rabbuh Mansour Hadi – who is currently in Riyadh – for military intervention against the Houthis.



The Houthis, for their part, have denounced the offensive as an unwarranted "Saudi-American onslaught" against Yemen.



Some Gulf States accuse Shiite Iran of supporting Yemen's Houthi insurgency.



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