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Coalition opens probe into deadly Yemen hospital raid

A USA aerial attack on an MSF-run hospital in Afghanistan last October killed 42 people.

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United Nations deputy spokesman Farhan Haq said the U.N.is trying to gather details on Monday’s attack.

At the time of Monday’s attack, there were 23 patients in the surgery ward, 23 in the maternity ward, 13 newborns and 12 patients in the pediatric ward, the group said.

The most lethal attack was “reported to have been an air strike”, a statement brought out here by the secretary general’s spokesman said.

Worldwide medical humanitarian organization Doctors Without Borders says a medical center it runs received people who were killed and wounded in the attack.

Backed by Saudi-led airstrikes, pro-Hadi forces have since managed to reclaim large swathes of the country’s south – including provisional capital Aden – but have failed to retake Sanaa and other strategic areas.

Hajjah’s provincial health director, Ayman Madhkour, said that 15 people were killed and more than 25 injured in the attack, which he said was carried out by coalition aircraft.

On Sunday, hours after the negotiations ended, the coalition launched 30 air strikes throughout Yemen.

The medical charity confirmed the strike hit its facility in Hajja province near the Houthi rebel stronghold of Saada on Monday afternoon.

London-based watchdog Amnesty International described the hospital s bombardment as “a deplorable act that has cost civilian lives, including medical staff”.

The coalition denied targeting a school in Haydan, instead saying that it had bombed a camp at which the Houthis were training child soldiers. Meanwhile, the spokeswoman for the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, Ravina Shamdasani, noted that July and August witnessed some of the war’s worst violence against civilians, with eight children killed in a July 5 rocket attack in the eastern city of Marib.

Amnesty International called for a thorough and independent probe into the attack.

The coalition assessment team has opened an investigation into these reports as a matter of urgency and is seeking additional information, in particular from Médecins Sans Frontières, the statement said.

Armed rebels were inside parliament for Saturday’s session, which was held as Saudi-led coalition warplanes pounded military targets around the capital, parliamentary sources said.

Earlier on Monday, the coalition announced that it would permit the United Nations and humanitarian organizations to operate flights into Sana’a airport, whose closure it ordered after the suspension of the peace talks.

“Sanaa worldwide airport will be reopened to United Nations flights and those of other agencies from Monday”, a coalition statement said.

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The escalating move came after UN-sponsored peace talks with their foes of internationally recognized government of President Hadi in Kuwait collapsed after over three months of fruitless negotiations to end years-long civil war.

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