Air-force planes reportedly carried out two strikes over Abyan province, one of which mistakenly hit the Hamza mosque, its nearby hospital, and a police station in the town of Jaar on Monday, AP reported.
The Yemeni regime claims it launched the attacks against al-Qaeda militants in the south.
This comes as anti-government uprisings against the ruling of embattled President Ali Abdullah Saleh have been raging across Yemen since January.
Hundreds of thousands of people have turned out for regular demonstrations in Yemen’s major cities, calling for an end to corruption and unemployment and demanding Saleh’s ouster.
Hundreds of people have been killed and many more injured during the unrest as a result of the brutal crackdown on anti-government protests by military forces and loosely-organized individuals loyal to Saleh.
Protesters insist that the US and Saudi Arabia are making efforts to save the ailing regime of Saleh.
They reject the 3-step plan, drafted by the [Persian] Gulf Cooperation Council ([P]GCC) in April, aimed at resolving the crisis in the country.
The plan formulates Saleh’s resignation, the formation of a national unity government by the opposition and an arrangement to have a committee of senior military commanders to oversee a reorganization of the country’s armed forces.
The deal includes a provision to grant Saleh and his family immunity from prosecution, something that the opposition fiercely opposes.
Meanwhile, Saleh and five other high-ranking officials have fled to Saudi Arabia, ostentatiously for medical treatment, following a rocket attack on the Yemeni presidential palace in Sana’a on June 3.
