Three Yemeni soldiers were killed and six others wounded in a roadside bombing that targeted the convoy of a security chief in the southeastern city of Mukalla on Sunday.

Three Yemeni soldiers were killed and six others wounded in a roadside bombing that targeted the convoy of a security chief in the southeastern city of Mukalla on Sunday, a security official and witnesses told Agence France Presse.

The bomb went off as a three-vehicle convoy passed through the Huwaysh neighborhood of the coastal city, witnesses said.

It targeted the convoy of Colonel Abdulwahab al-Waeli, head of Central Security in the city, the security official said.

It was not clear who was behind the attack but Al-Qaeda remains active in the south and east of impoverished Yemen.

Al-Qaeda loyalists have carried out a spate of deadly attacks against security forces and their militia allies since President Abdrabuh Mansur Hadi came to power earlier this year pledging to crush the militants.

Al-Qaeda took advantage of a nearly year-long revolution against Hadi's predecessor, Ali Abdullah Saleh, to seize large swathes of the south and east.

In an all-out offensive launched in May, the army retook a string of towns in Abyan province, which neighbors Aden to the east.