GENEVA/ADEN: The UN said on Friday it was working with Saudi Arabia to try to bring Yemen’s government to peace talks after it rejected a plan brokered by the US.
US Secretary of State John Kerry claimed on Tuesday that the Saudi-led coalition, that backs the government in its fight against the Houthi group, supported a cease-fire plan that the Houthis have agreed to.
But President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi’s internationally recognized government rejected Kerry’s move, complaining that it played into the hands of the Houthis.
“We are working very closely with Saudi Arabia and other countries in the region that can influence (the parties to the conflict),” UN Deputy Secretary-General Jan Eliasson told a news conference in Geneva.
“We have discovered a stronger and stronger view that this war must come to an end but we have to bring them back to negotiating table,” he said.
Military and medical sources said Friday that more than 20 people have been killed in intense fighting between Houthis and Hadi government soldiers on the outskirts of Taiz.
Sources told AFP that 13 Houthis and eight Hadi soldiers were killed over the past 24 hours.
Two civilians were also killed and 16 wounded as Houthis fired Iranian-supplied rockets on a residential area of Taiz, they said.
The medical charity Doctors Without Borders (MSF) said emergency rooms it supports or manages in Taiz province had received a total of 21 dead and 76 wounded.
The Interior Ministry, meanwhile, announced that a soldier, Mohamed bin Ali Al-Hussain Al-Ja’afri, was martyred as the southern borders in Asir region were hit by rockets fired from Yemen. The soldier succumbed to his injuries in hospital, said a ministry spokesperson.
UN in talks with Riyadh on Yemen
UN in talks with Riyadh on Yemen
