Red Cross boat docks in Yemen`s Aden: Coalition spokesman

Riyadh: A Red Cross boat carrying medical aid and personnel docked Wednesday in Yemen`s southern Aden port but nearby fighting preventing it from unloading, a spokesman for the Saudi-led coalition said.

"A boat belonging to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) arrived at the port of Aden," said Brigadier-General Ahmed al-Assiri, spokesman for the alliance conducted air strikes against rebels in Yemen.

"But because of the troubled situation in some neighbourhoods near the port," it remained "difficult" to deliver the aid on board to those in need, Assiri told reporters in Riyadh.

The aid "is still at the port," he added.

AFP could not immediately verify the state of the aid in Aden, but the head of Doctors Without Borders (MSF) in Yemen, Marie-Elisabeth Ingres, said that a team of five medics on board an ICRC boat "were able to leave the port".

Earlier on Wednesday, Ingres said that a boat travelling from Djibouti and carrying 2.5 tonnes of medical aid docked in Aden, the first such shipment since the coalition airstrikes began.