Sanaa, January 16 (RHC)-- At least 30 people have been killed ​in a Saudi airstrike in northwestern Yemen, a day after six troops were killed at a military base of the kingdom near the border.

The fatalities came on Saturday during an air raid on residential buildings in the Dhahian district in the Sa’ada province. Earlier in the day, Saudi warplanes carried out nine offensives against two places in the southwestern Ta'izz province’s capital of the same name, the local al-Masira TV reported.

Yemen’s official Saba Net news agency said the airstrikes had left a number of civilians dead and injured. The attacks came one day after Yemeni snipers killed six troops at the al-Mahruq military base in Najran.

A British officer, affiliated with the infamous U.S. security firm formerly known as Blackwater, was also killed in the al-Wazi’iyah district of the province.