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Yemen ceasefire cracks as fighting rages

October 22, 2016 at 4:45 pm

Saudi-backed Yemeni government forces and Iran-allied Houthis rebels accused each other of violating a three-day ceasefire today as the United Nations sought to quell persistent fighting by extending the truce.

The ceasefire, which was due to end at midnight local time today (21:00 GMT), was aimed at paving the way for talks to end a 19-month war in the Arab world’s poorest country and allowing badly needed aid to be delivered.

Ground fighting has raged largely unabated despite the truce, but air attacks on the capital, Sana’a, have stopped and there were fewer Houthi missile strikes on Saudi Arabia, residents and local officials said.

A Saudi-led coalition backing the exiled government accused the Houthis of violating the ceasefire almost a thousand times in the last 24 hours by launching mortar and armed attacks along Yemen’s border with the kingdom and in several Yemeni provinces.

Houthi-run news agency Saba said Houthi forces had repelled government advances backed up by Saudi-led airstrikes toward the capital Sana’a from multiple directions.

Ali Mohsen Al-Ahmar, the exiled vice president and a powerful military leader, said after a meeting with the UN special envoy to Yemen in Riyadh late last night that the government sought peace but would respond to Houthi attacks.

“The legitimate government remains committed to restraint in recognition of the efforts of UN and for the sake of achieving the peace which has been rejected by the coup militias,” Al-Ahmar said in a statement on his official Facebook page.

Al-Ahmar said UN envoy Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed asked to extend the truce for another 72 hours, and government sources told Reuters foreign diplomats were also lobbying both sides to prolong the ceasefire.

The Houthis have also called for a negotiated solution to the conflict but have yet to agree on a truce extension.