Yemen weapons depot blast kills six soldiers

An accidental blast at an army ammunitions depot stocked with mines and explosives killed six soldiers in south Yemen on Monday, a local municipality official said.

The blast occurred Monday morning in an explosives warehouse at an army base in the southern port city of Aden, "killing six soldiers and wounding others," local municipality chief Abdel Munim al-Abd told AFP.

He said an initial investigation revealed that the explosion took place "while soldiers were organising the explosives in the warehouse."

According to Munim, the warehouse is stocked with large quantities of mines and explosives that were recovered after Al-Qaeda's retreat from their strongholds in the southern Abyan province in June.

Local residents said a series of loud blasts rang out across the city and large plumes of smoke could be seen rising from the site.

This is the second such accident in Yemen in less than a week.

On Thursday, a shell fired accidentally at an army weapons depot in the Yemeni capital Sanaa killed two people and wounded seven others.