After earlier AP and AFP reports, Saudi TV station Al-Arabiya quoted coalition spokesman Ahmed Al-Asiri as saying there were “no foreign forces in Aden”.
AP originally quoted several Yemeni officials and witnesses speaking of coalition ground forces arriving in Aden under the protection of helicopter gunships. AFP had quoted an unnamed Yemeni official talking of a limited coalition force in Aden and of another one being “on its way”.
Iranian state-run news agency FARS, meanwhile, cited eyewitnesses’ accounts of Apache attack helicopters flying over Aden, seemingly backing the claims of foreign troops arriving.
The coalition has not ruled out a ground intervention, but has always been wary of being drawn into the Yemeni conflict, recalling Saudi forces losses suffered in 2009 against the Houthis, and the disastrous Egyptian intervention in Yemen during the 1960’s.
