GENEVA: At least 136 civilians have been killed over 10 days of Saudi-led air strikes on Yemen this month, the United Nations said Tuesday, with the organisation’s human rights chief decrying an “inferno” on the ground.

The UN human rights office said it had tallied 136 civilians killed and another 87 injured in the strikes on Sanaa, Saada, Al Hudaydah, Marib and Taez governorates between December 6 and 16.

“We are deeply concerned by the recent surge in civilian casualties in Yemen as a result of intensified air strikes by the Saudi-led coalition,” spokesman Rupert Colville told reporters in Geneva.

A Saudi-led coalition has been waging an air campaign against Houthi rebels since March 2015 in an attempt to shore up the internationally recognised government of Abedrabbo Mansur Hadi.

More than 8,750 people have been killed in the conflict since the intervention in the impoverished Arabian Peninsula country, where more than 2,000 people have also died of cholera this year.

The air strikes have intensified since the December 4 killing of ex-president Ali Abdullah Saleh at the hands of the Houthis after his alliance with the rebels collapsed.

In an interview with AFP on Monday, UN rights chief Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein lamented “the total impunity that seems to exist (in) attacks from all sides”, although he said “the majority of casualties is still coming from the coalition air strikes.”