Five die in air strike on Sanaa
AN AIR strike by the Saudiled coalition on the old quarter of the Yemeni capital killed five people yesterday and destroyed three houses in the Unesco-listed heritage site.
Residents said the predawn strike was the first direct hit on old Sanaa, since the launch of the bombing campaign against Houthi rebels in late March.
The missile hit the Qassimi neighbourhood, which boasts thousands of houses built before the 11th century. It did not explode but it still destroyed three three-storey houses and killed five residents, including a woman and a child, medics and witnesses said.
The target of the raid was not immediately clear.
The old city has already suffered some damage from air strikes on nearby targets, including the defence ministry, prompting a protest from Unesco last month.
Sanaa’s old city, situated in a mountain valley, has been inhabited for more than 2 500 years and was a major centre for the propagation of Islam, boasting over 100 mosques, 14 public baths and more than 6 000 houses built before the 11th century.
It was inscribed on Unesco’s World Heritage List in 1986. The multi-storey houses rising above stone-ground floors were built of rammed earth and burnt brick.
Each building is decorated with geometric patterns of fired bricks and white gypsum, inspired by traditional Islamic art.
The United Nations special envoy to Yemen will hold separate “proximity” peace talks with both sides in Geneva tomorrow, a UN spokesman said yesterday.
Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed has convened the talks, expected to last three days, to try to end more than two months of war between Iran-backed Houthis and forces loyal to President AbdRabbu Mansour Hadi, who has fled to Saudi Arabia.
“The talks will start as proximity talks, which means the envoy will be shuttling between the two groups in the hope that he can bring them together during these consultations,” UN spokesman Ahmad Fawzi told a news briefing in Geneva. — AFP-Reuters