About 12 Indian sailors have gone missing after their cargo ship sank off the coast of southeast Yemen's Hadramout province, local Yemeni authorities said Saturday, Xinhua reported.
A cargo ship, registered in Hadramout, sank off the coastal City of Shehr, leaving 12 Indian sailors missing, Yemen's center of security media said on its website.
A local government official confirmed to Xinhua that "merchant ship No. 1626 owned by a Yemeni businessman fell while transporting trade materials and commercial goods near Hadramout's coast."
"We have sent rescue boats and asked coast guards in the area to help in the search for the missing Indian sailors," he added.
Last year, the Yemeni Defense Ministry said it has seized an Iranian cargo vessel while it was smuggling weapons into a Yemeni fishing boat near the Bab el- Mandeb Strait off the Red Sea coasts.
The unrest-ridden Arab country, which struggles to achieve a two-year political transitional process backed by the UN Security Council, has recently witnessed several cases of illegal weapons shipments off its coasts.