Coalition fighters capture coastal area in Yemen
DUBAI: A Western-backed Saudiled coalition scored its first major gains in Yemen since former President Ali Abdullah Saleh was killed on Monday when local fighters captured an area on the Red Sea coast from Ansar Allah fighters, residents said on Thursday.
Local fighters loyal to Saleh, who was killed by the Ansar Allah fighters after switching sides in the civil war, captured Al Khoukha district about 350 km south-west of the capital Sanaa after heavy fighting over Wednesday night which also involved coalition forces.
Ansar Allah forces control Sanaa and much of the rest of the impoverished country, where three years of war has killed more than 10,000 people and brought it to the verge of famine.
Saleh had helped the Ansar Allah win control of Sanaa and much of the north and his decision to abandon them had major implications on the battlefield.
The Ansar Allah crushed a proSaleh uprising in the capital and shot him dead in an attack on his convoy on December 4.
The US and UK-backed Saudi-led coalition has stepped up air strikes on Yemen since then as Ansar Allah forces have tightened their grip on the capital.
Residents said spurred opposition Saleh’s to the killing Ansar Allah and fighters known as the Southern Resistance, together with other local militia, launched attacks on Al Khoukha on Wednesday.
At least 25 people from both sides were killed in the fighting before Yemeni fighters captured the town of Al Khoukha and a small fishing port.
A spokesman for the Ansar Allah movement could not be immediately reached for comment.
The Ansar Allah-run Saba news agency has reported heavy air strikes by the coalition on Sanaa and in the Saada province in northern Yemen, but made no mention of any ground offensive in Al Khoukha area. GENEVA: Syrian government negotiators will return to Geneva this weekend to rejoin United Nations-backed peace talks, after leaving the city in protest last week, the UN envoy said on Thursday.
“The government has informed us that they would fly back to Geneva on Sunday the 10th of December”, UN mediator Staffan de Mistura told reporters, confirming information reported by the Syrian state news agency SANA.
The government delegation is scheduled to stay until December 15, when the eighth round of the faltering UN-brokered talks is due to wrap up.
The negotiations aimed at ending nearly seven years of bloodshed in Syria reopened last week.
The talks were halted over the weekend before resuming on Tuesday, but without the government team headed by Syria’s UN Ambassador Bashar al Jaafari.
Jaafari had criticised the talks before his departure, saying there were “big problems in this round”, a reference to the opposition’s insistence on President Bashar al Assad’s removal.
The opposition, united in one delegation for the first time, has so far defied calls to give up its demand that Assad step down before any peace deal can be reached.
Jaafari described that position as “provocative” and “irresponsible”, warning that “there will be no progress” if the opposition maintained its stance.
For several days, government sources had said officials were still deliberating whether they would come back to Geneva.
De Mistura has met with the opposition’s delegation in the meantime.
De Mistura said he expected both sides to “seriously engage” in negotiations next week, which will be focused on shaping a new Syrian constitution and organising UN-supervised elections.
RUSSIA CLAIM: Russia’s defence ministry on Thursday said its mission to oust IS militants from Syria had been “accomplished” with the country “completely liberated” from the extremist group. “The Russian armed forces’ goal to defeat armed groups of the ISIL terrorist organisation in Syria has been accomplished,” said senior military officer Sergei Rudskoi, using an alternative acronym for the group.
“There is not a single village or district in Syria under the control of ISIL. The territory of Syria has been completely liberated from fighters of this terrorist organisation,” he told reporters.
There has been an “unprecedented” involvement by Russia’s airforce in recent days, he said, with warplanes making 100 sorties and staging up to 250 strikes daily.
— AFP