Yemen ceasefire begins as peace talks open

A ceasefire went into effect in Yemen yesterday as United Nations-sponsored peace talks opened in Switzerland in a new push to end months of fighting that has killed nearly 6,000 people and dragged in foreign powers, a UN spokesman said.

Army commanders and residents said the truce appeared to be largely holding despite some minor violations reported by both sides.

The UN said it was preparing to deliver medicine and food to Yemen this week, taking advantage of the seven-day ceasefire to address one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises.

"It is you who will decide whether peace will prevail or Yemen will be thrust further into darkness, tragedy and suffering," UN special envoy Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed said in opening remarks to delegates in Geneva.

The war has pitted the Houthis, a northern-based Shia movement who have occupied the capital, Sanaa, and much of the rest of the country since September 2014, against the government of President Abd Rabbu Mansour Hadi.

Ground troops

A Saudi-led coalition, mainly comprising Gulf Arab forces and aided by the

United States

, intervened in March with air strikes and ground troops and has rolled back some of the advances of the Houthis, who Riyadh says are a proxy for regional rival

Iran

.

The talks opened with an agenda being agreed and with senior delegates meeting face to face.

The main task for the negotiations will be agreeing on how to implement a UN Security Council Resolution in April that called on the Houthi movement to quit Sanaa and other cities.

– (Reuters)