JEDDAH: Cross-border rebel shelling from Yemen killed one person and wounded a father and his child in Jazan early on Friday, said the Civil Defense.

The victims of the 7 a.m. shelling by Iran-backed Houthi rebels in the Jazan region were all Yemeni residents of the Kingdom, spokesman Yahya Al-Qahtani said.

The projectile, fired from Yemen, struck Al-Twal village, two kilometers from the border.

Late on Friday, another missile fired by the Houthis in Yemen was intercepted by the Saudi air defense.

Separately, a 72-hour truce for conflict-riddled Yemen is expected to be announced soon, the UN envoy to the Arabian Peninsula country said Friday after talks with rebel representatives.

Three months of negotiations in Kuwait earlier this year ended without a breakthrough, dashing hopes for an end to the war between Shiite Houthi rebels and government forces that has gripped Yemen for more than 18 months.

Fighting flared anew when the talks collapsed in August, prompting UN envoy Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed to warn that restoring a cease-fire for Yemen was critical.

Speaking in the Omani capital on Friday after talks with representatives of the Houthis, the Mauritanian diplomat said a new truce deal was in the works as part of a wider peace plan. “An agreement for a 72-hour renewable truce will be announced in the coming days,” he said in remarks carried by the official Oman news agency.

The Houthis and their allies, supporters of ousted president Ali Abdullah Saleh, “are convinced of the need for a cease-fire,” the diplomat said. He said he would head to Riyadh to meet with Yemen’s President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi.

The UN envoy said he was hoping to draft a new peace plan for Yemen “in the next two weeks” but that he first needed to carry out more consultations.

Yemenis in the meantime vowed to stage the biggest demonstration in the capital Sanaa on Sunday.

A hashtag, #Ana Nazel (I will take part), was initiated on Friday calling on Yemeni citizens to stand up to the Houthi starvation tactics in Yemen and their refusal to pay their salaries.

Prominent Yemeni journalist Abbas Al-Dhaleai pledged to take part in the protest and urged all countrymen to participate, vowing that the protest would be the biggest ever.

“Next Sunday, Sanaa streets will see the biggest demonstration against the Houthi’s starvation and the payment of salaries policy. It will be a popular uprising,” he said in a tweet.

Houthi militias have been desperately launching random strikes into neighborhoods and on civilians in the southern region of the Kingdom, resulting in numerous deaths, injuries, and the destruction of homes and property. Many of the victims are women and children.