DUBAI — Bahrain announced Friday that five of its soldiers were killed in southern Saudi Arabia where they had been posted to help defend the border with neighboring war-wracked Yemen.

Bahrain is a member of a Saudi-led Arab coalition that, since March, has battled Shiite Houthi rebels in Yemen to restore the rule of President Abedrabbu Mansour Hadi, exiled in Riyadh.

The Bahraini armed forces command, in a statement carried by state news agency BNA, named the soldiers killed “while defending the southern border of the Saudi Kingdom” but gave no details on the circumstances.

Around 60 people, mainly military personnel, have been killed in cross-border rebel attacks in the south of the Kingdom since the launch of airstrikes on the Houthis and their allies. — AFP