Coalition SOS to UN to save Hodeida truce
sanaa — A hard-won ceasefire in Yemen’s battleground city of Hodeida will collapse if rebel violations persist and the United Nations does not intervene, the Saudi-led coalition backing the government warned on Wednesday.
Underscoring still-simmering tensions, the coalition said it launched an air strike at the airport in the rebel-held capital Sanaa, destroying a drone that was preparing to take off.
It was the first air raid that the alliance has confirmed carrying out at the airport since peace talks last week in Sweden that resulted in the Hodeida ceasefire accord. A breakdown of the truce would risk a renewed coalition offensive and a halt to humanitarian operations at the city’s vital Red Sea port.
UN observers are due in Yemen to head up monitoring teams made up of government and rebel representatives tasked with overseeing the implementation of the UN-brokered ceasefire that took effect on Tuesday. The UN chair of the Redeployment Coordination Committee will convene its first meeting by video conference from New York on Wednesday before heading to Yemen ‘later this week’, UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric said. —
geneva — Yemen’s warring parties have exchanged lists with a total of 16,000 names of people believed to be detained as part of a prisoner swap deal agreed last week, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said on Wednesday.
The Iran-aligned Houthi movement and the Saudi-backed Yemeni government are to free prisoners simultaneously next month as part of confidence-building measures agreed at United Nations peace talks in Sweden.
“The parties to the conflict have exchanged lists of 16,000, they now have six weeks to make sure that the lists are accurate, that those people are detained,” Fabrizio Carboni, ICRC regional director for the Middle East, told a briefing.
Each side’s list had 8,000 names of people they are looking for who may be detained — supposed to reflect “all” people in custody — but some may be dead, missing or duplicates, he said, speaking on return from Yemen.
The operation will require the Saudi-led coalition to guarantee that air space is secure for flights, Carboni added.
Under the agreement, 40 days from the December 11 signing, or January 21, the ICRC will have 10 days to interview privately each detainee released, make medical checks, and arrange transfers to their places of origin by bus or plane, he said.
They are expected to include people in custody outside Yemen and foreigners from “a couple of nationalities” held in the country, Carboni said, declining to elaborate.
Meanwhile, the Saudi-led coalition said it launched an air strike on Wednesday at the airport in the rebel-held capital Sanaa, destroying a drone.
It is the first air strike that the alliance has confirmed carrying out at the airport since peace talks last week in Sweden that resulted in a ceasefire accord for the battleground port city of Hodeida.
The coalition said in a statement carried by the Al Ekhbariya news channel that it targeted an unmanned aerial vehicle and “destroyed the aircraft that was in the process of preparing to be launched, thwarting an imminent terrorist attack”.
Each side’s list has 8,000 names of people they are looking for who may be detained — supposed to reflect all people in custody — but some may be dead, missing or duplicates Fabrizio Carboni, ICRC regional director