ADEN, May 15: At least 44 people including 30 militants were killed overnight in Yemen, officials and residents said on Tuesday, as the government pressed ahead with a new US-backed offensive against insurgents in the south.

The Islamist rebellion is of serious concern to the United States and to Yemen’s much bigger neighbour Saudi Arabia, which both fear that instability could give Al Qaeda’s Yemen-based regional wing a bigger foothold near oil shipping routes through the Red Sea.

Residents and local officials said heavy fighting erupted late on Monday between the army and militants in an area called al-Jabalain in the south, as troops tried to advance on the militant-held city of Jaar.

The clashes continued until early on Tuesday, killing at least eight militants and one Yemeni soldier, they said, adding that the army had captured two Somali Islamist fighters.

Since the start of anti-government protests in early 2011, Islamist militants calling themselves Ansar al-Sharia (Partisans of Islamic Law) have expanded their influence in Yemen, seizing several towns and swathes of territory in the south.

Although the group is inspired by Al Qaeda, the precise nature of their operational ties is unclear.

Both seek the application of Islamic law and Ansar al-Sharia this month said it had released more than 70 captured Yemeni soldiers on orders from Nasser al-Wuhayshi, the head of Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP).

United Nations agencies and non-governmental organisations working in Yemen called in a statement on “involved parties to take all necessary steps to avoid civilian casualties and to minimise collateral damage”.

As people gathered to assess the damage, a second strike killed six of them, all civilians, the residents added.—Reuters