An unidentified warplane has attacked the presidential palace in Aden after forces loyal to President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi stormed a camp where a renegade commander had barricaded himself, a presidential aide said Thursday.

The attack on the palace, where Hadi took refuge last month after fleeing house arrest in Saana after Houthi rebels took control of the capital, illustrates a sharp escalation of Yemen’s months-long armed turmoil.

Residents said anti-aircraft guns opened fire at the plane, and smoke was seen rising from the area.

A presidential aide said Hadi had “been evacuated to a safe place but he has not left the country”.

Both the attack on Hadi’s compound and the fighting on the ground appeared to be part of a deepening power struggle between Hadi and the Shiite Muslim Houthi group, which controls Sanaa and is allied with former president Ali Abdullah Saleh.

The identity of the aircraft was not immediately known, but residents in Sanaa said they saw an unusually busy level of flights by military aircraft in the skies over the capital.

Earlier in the day, soldiers and militiamen loyal to Hadi fought their way into Aden’s international airport and stormed an adjacent military base, residents said.

General Abdel-Hafez al-Saqqaf had been holed up for days in the base after he refused an order by Hadi to hand over control of the Special Forces in the city to another commander, a senior security source said.

At least six people were killed in the clashes around the airport and the base, residents and a senior military commander said. They said Saqqaf’s whereabouts were not known.

In a statement in late afternoon, the Houthi-led Supreme Security Committee urged an end to the fighting in Aden, saying that both sides “are obliged to keep the peace and return to the negotiating table,” according to a statement carried by state news agency Saba.

(FRANCE 24 with AFP, REUTERS)