(Sanaa) A two-month truce comes into effect on Saturday evening in Yemen under an agreement wrested by the United Nations from pro-government forces and Houthi rebels engaged in a devastating war for nearly eight years.
Posted at 10:18 a.m.
In this conflict which has claimed hundreds of thousands of lives according to the UN and pushed this poor country in the Arabian Peninsula to the brink of famine, a previous nationwide truce agreed in 2016 between the belligerents and other decided unilaterally fizzled out.
Neighboring Yemen, Saudi Arabia, an oil-rich Gulf monarchy, has since 2015 led a military coalition that has been helping Yemeni President Abd Rabbo Mansour Hadi in the face of the Iran-backed Houthis who deny supplying them with weapons.
The nationwide cessation of hostilities is to take effect at 7 p.m. (12 p.m. ET), on the first day of the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan, UN envoy Hans Grundberg said in a statement Friday.
“The belligerents responded positively to the United Nations’ proposal for a two-month truce,” he said, stressing that it could be “renewed with (their) consent.”
The announcement is the culmination of efforts by Mr Grundberg, who has been trying for months to reach a truce and relaunch negotiations for a settlement in Yemen where rival regional powers Sunni Saudi Arabia and Shia Iran , are engaged in a proxy war.
On Thursday, the UN envoy spoke separately with representatives of the Houthis in Oman and in recent days with those of the Yemeni power and the Saudi kingdom in Riyadh.
The coalition said it “supports the Yemeni government’s agreement for a truce” as well as “UN efforts to consolidate it”.
“In Yemen and beyond”
Efforts for a truce have intensified after an escalation in Houthi attacks on Saudi Arabia.
On March 25, they launched 16 attacks against targets in the kingdom, one of which caused a huge fire at an oil site in Jeddah (west) near the Formula 1 circuit which hosted the Grand Prix. These attacks caused no casualties.
In retaliation, Saudi aircraft bombarded areas controlled by the Houthis.
“The parties have agreed to halt all air, land and sea offensives in Yemen and beyond its borders,” Grundberg said.
Tankers will also be “allowed to enter the ports of the province of Hodeida (west)” and possible commercial flights “from and to the airport of the capital Sanaa, with predetermined destinations”, according to him.
The coalition controls Yemen’s air and sea space and only UN flights are allowed through Sanaa. A “blockade” denounced by the Houthis.
East Sanaa and the ports of Hodeidah are in Houthi hands. Ports are essential for the delivery of aid.
“The war turned all my dreams into nightmares”, but “this time I am optimistic. This truce is not like the previous ones, and the fact that it coincides with Ramadan gives us a lot of hope,” Asma Zayed, a student in Hodeida, told AFP.
In this context of de-escalation, the belligerents have “agreed to meet under the aegis (of the UN) to open roads in Taiz and other regions of Yemen”, according to Mr. Grundberg.
After seven years of intervention, the Saudi-led coalition has failed to dislodge rebels from conquered areas in northern Yemen.
According to observers, the rebels display a certain intransigence attributed to the lack of firmness of the international community towards them.
The United States welcomed the new truce but stressed the need to reach “a compromise that can bring lasting peace”.
For its part, France considered that this was “a major step forward which should make it possible to alleviate the suffering of the Yemeni people and which brings hope”.