SANA, Yemen — The death toll from Saudi-led airstrikes that hit a wedding party in Yemen has risen to 131, making it the deadliest single incident since the start of the country’s civil war, medical officials said Tuesday.
At least 80 women were among the victims in Monday’s strike in the central province of Taiz, said the officials, who work in the province and have been neutral in the conflict. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to reporters.
Hassan Boucenine, of the Geneva-based Doctors Without Borders, called it the deadliest single incident since the beginning of the conflict.
“It’s worse and worse . . . it’s beyond despair,” Boucenine said, speaking about the war.
The United Nations says at least 2,355 civilians have been killed in fighting since March, when the coalition began launching airstrikes against Shi’ite Houthi rebels and allied army units, who control the capital and are at war with the internationally recognized government as well as southern separatists, local militias, and Sunni extremists.
The coalition apparently struck the wedding party by mistake in al-Wahga, a village near the town of Mokha and the strategic Strait of Bab al-Mandab, Yemeni security officials said. The region is largely populated by fishermen and livestock traders.
“They struck a wedding, there were only civilians there, and most of them died because the Mokha hospital is closed because of [a lack of supplies] — no drugs, no fuel, no electricity, no nothing, so the staff left,” Boucenine said. The provincial capital of Taiz was inaccessible due to ongoing fighting.
Victims were taken to Hodeida province to the north, he said, and most of them died on the road. Witness Ahmed Nagy said many injured were moved in pickup trucks used for transporting animals.
Paramedic Khaled Basees said local people took on the medical operation without state assistance, adding that some of the dead were torn apart and their unidentifiable remains buried in a mass grave.
A witness, Mehdi Abdel Salam, said missile fragments destroyed several homes next to the wedding.
Officials from the Saudi-led coalition could not immediately be reached for comment.
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon condemned the airstrikes and called on all parties involved in the conflict in Yemen, “from inside and outside the country, to immediately cease all military activities.”