Smoke billowing from the Al-Qasr hotel in Aden's western suburbs after it was hit by rocket attacks on Tuesday. Inset, Khaled Bahah, who escaped unharmed.

AFP/Abu Dhabi

Rebel attacks on a hotel used by Yemen's prime minister and military installations in the southern city of Aden on Tuesday killed 15 Arab coalition troops and pro-government forces, Emirati media reported.

Rocket attacks by Iran-backed rebels and allied forces "targeted the government headquarters and several military positions (and) left 15 Arab coalition and Yemeni resistance martyrs," WAM news agency said.

WAM said that four Emirati soldiers were among the dead and that several others were wounded.

The United Arab Emirates, a key member of the Saudi-led coalition battling Yemeni rebels, has troops deployed in Aden. It has so far lost 67 soldiers in Yemen.

Prime Minister Khaled Bahah escaped unharmed after the rocket attack on his hotel in Aden early Tuesday.

Rockets also targeted a nearby barracks used by Saudi-led forces as well as a residence of members of the coalition, according to an AFP photographer, who saw helicopters evacuating casualties from the site.

President Abedrabbo Mansour Hadi and his government returned to Aden last month following six months in exile, after loyalist forces regained control of the port city, its province and four other southern provinces from the rebels.

Troops loyal to Hadi have been backed by a Saudi-led bombing campaign and troops and military hardware provided by Gulf countries since March.

"Prime Minister Khaled Bahah is in good health and was not harmed," said Nayef al-Bakri, the minister of youth and sports.

A security source and witnesses said the building had been hit by two rockets.

People had been left "dead and wounded" by the attack, a local official told AFP on condition of anonymity, without saying if that included any members of government.

He said one of the rockets hit the hotel's main entrance and that a third rocket fired at the building had missed and landed in the sea.

Bahah and his ministers have been installed in Aden - declared Yemen's provisional capital after it was taken back from Shia Houthi rebels in mid-July - after spending six months in exile in Saudi Arabia.

Columns of smoke were rising from the Al-Qasr hotel in the city's western suburbs on Tuesday morning, an AFP reporter said.

Ambulances and civil defence forces were on the scene, witnesses said.

A separate rocket attack targeted a nearby barracks used by pro-government forces, residents said, but failed to hit its target.