DUBAI: Yemen’s warring parties have committed to a new ceasefire and agreed to engage in a UN-led peace process to end the war, the UN envoy for Yemen said Saturday.
The announcement by UN special envoy for Yemen, Hans Grundberg, marks the latest step to end the deadly nine-year war that has killed hundreds of thousands of people and triggered one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises.
It follows recent meetings by Grundberg in Saudi Arabia and Oman with Rashad Al-Alimi, head of Yemen’s Presidential Council and Mohammed Abdul Salam, the chief negotiator of the Iran-backed Houthi rebels.
Grundberg said he “welcomes the parties’ commitment to a set of measures to implement a nation-wide ceasefire... and (to) engage in preparations for the resumption of an inclusive political process,” according to a statement by his office.
The envoy “will now engage with the parties to establish a road map under UN auspices that includes these commitments and supports their implementation,” the statement added.
A UN-brokered ceasefire that took effect in April 2022 brought a sharp reduction in hostilities. The truce expired in October last year, though fighting largely remains on hold.
Grundberg will now “engage with the parties to establish a roadmap under UN auspices” that includes these commitments.
It includes commitments to pay civil servants’ salaries, open routes into the rebel-blockaded city of Taiz and other parts of Yemen and resume oil exports, according to the statement.
“Yemenis are watching and waiting for this new opportunity to provide for tangible results and progress toward lasting peace,” Grundberg said.
“The parties have taken a significant step. Their commitments are, first and foremost, an obligation to the Yemeni people.”
The agreement comes amid a flurry of attacks by the Houthi rebels on key shipping lanes in the Red Sea in solidarity with Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, where Israel is fighting Hamas militants.
The Houthis have pledged to attack Israel-linked vessels or ships heading to Israeli ports unless an end is brought to the Israel-Hamas war that started on October 7.
They have launched more than 100 drone and missile attacks, targeting 10 merchant vessels involving more than 35 different countries, according to the Pentagon.
The attacks by the rebels are imperilling a transit route that carries up to 12 percent of global trade, prompting the United States to set up a multinational naval task force to protect Red Sea shipping.
The Houthi “military actions hinder progress toward a peaceful resolution,” Mohammed Albasha, a senior Middle East analyst for the US-based Navanti Group, told AFP.
“The Houthis have transitioned... to becoming aggressors targeting civilian assets,” he said.
Eight years in, the rebels control swathes of the country and command an impressive arsenal of weapons that they have used to attack Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, another coalition member.
Many analysts are pessimistic that Riyadh’s plans for a downsized military role will bring peace to Yemen, which remains deeply fractured along religious, regional and political lines.
Yemen warring parties agree to ceasefire, UN-led peace process
https://arab.news/6y3hn
Yemen warring parties agree to ceasefire, UN-led peace process
- Hans Grundberg will now “engage with the parties to establish a roadmap under UN auspices”
- Agreement comes amid Houthi attacks on key shipping lanes in Red Sea in solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza
30 killed in drone attack on hospital in Sudan’s Darfur: medical source
The bombing of the Saudi Hospital on Friday evening “led to the destruction” of the hospital’s emergency building, the source told AFP, requesting anonymity for fear of retaliation.
It was not immediately clear which of Sudan’s warring sides had launched the attack.
Since April 2023, the Sudanese army has been at war with the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), who have seized nearly the entire vast western region of Darfur.
They have besieged El-Fasher, the state capital of North Darfur, since May, but have not managed to claim the city, where army-aligned militias have repeatedly pushed them back.
Last week, they issued an ultimatum demanding army forces and allies leave the city by Wednesday afternoon in advance of an expected offensive.
Local activists have reported intermittent fighting since, including repeated artillery fire from the RSF on the famine-hit Abu Shouk displacement camp.
On Friday morning alone, heavy shelling killed eight people in the camp, according to civil society group the Darfur General Coordination of Camps for the Displaced and Refugees.
The United Nations has voiced alarm, calling on both parties to ensure the protection of the city’s civilian population — some two million people.
“The people of El-Fasher have suffered so much already from many months of senseless violence and brutal violations and abuses, particularly in the course of the prolonged siege of their city,” United Nations rights office spokesman Seif Magango said Wednesday.
France in communication to maintain Hezbollah-Israel ceasefire, Lebanese statement citing Macron says
- Aoun asked Macron to oblige Israel to implement the agreement to preserve stability
CAIRO: French President Emmanuel Macron told his new Lebanese counterpart Joseph Aoun in a phone call that he is in communication to maintain the ceasefire between Hezbollah and Israel, according to a statement by the Lebanese President’s office on X.
Aoun asked Macron to oblige Israel to implement the agreement to preserve stability.
The phone call comes after the Israeli army on Saturday warned residents of dozens of Lebanese villages near the border against returning until further notice, a day after Israel said its forces would remain in south Lebanon beyond a Sunday deadline for their departure under the US-brokered ceasefire that ended last year’s war.
70 freed and ‘deported’ Palestinian prisoners reach Egypt
- According to Israeli list, more than 230 Palestinian prisoners to be released under the deal are serving life sentences
- They will be permanently expelled from the Palestinian territories upon their release
CAIRO: Seventy Palestinian prisoners arrived aboard buses in Egypt Saturday after being released from Israel as part of a Gaza ceasefire deal, state-linked Egyptian media reported.
Al-Qahera News, which is linked to state intelligence, said the prisoners were those “deported” by Israel, adding they would be transferred to Egyptian hospitals for treatment.
According to a list previously made public by Israeli authorities, more than 230 Palestinian prisoners to be released under the deal are serving life sentences for deadly attacks on Israelis, and will be permanently expelled from the Palestinian territories upon their release.
Broadcasted footage on Saturday showed some of the prisoners, wearing grey tracksuits, disembarking from two buses on the Egyptian side of the Rafah border crossing with Gaza.
After transiting in Egypt, the deported prisoners “will choose either Algeria, Turkiye or Tunisia” to reside, Amin Shuman, head of the Palestinian prisoners’ affairs committee, told AFP.
“It’s an indescribable feeling,” one of those released told Al-Qahera News, smiling and waving from the window of the bus.
The prisoners transferred from the Ktziot prison in Israel’s Negev desert into Egypt are part of a group of 200 prisoners released Saturday in exchange for four Israeli hostages freed by Hamas militants in Gaza.
Police kill a man who set himself on fire outside a Tunisian synagogue
- The man advanced toward a law enforcement officer while ablaze, and a second officer opened fire to protect his colleague
- The officer was hospitalized with burns, as was a passerby
TUNIS: A man set himself on fire in front of the Grand Synagogue in the Tunisian capital and was killed by police, the Interior Ministry said. A police officer and a passerby suffered burns.
The man started the fire after sundown Friday, around the time the synagogue holds Sabbath prayers.
The Interior Ministry said in a statement that the man advanced toward a law enforcement officer while ablaze, and a second officer opened fire to protect his colleague. The officer was hospitalized with burns, as was a passerby, the statement said.
The ministry did not release the man’s identity or potential motive for his act, saying only that he had unspecified psychiatric disorders.
Tunisia was historically home to a large Jewish population, now estimated to number about 1,500 people. Jewish sites in Tunisia have been targeted in the past.
A national guardsman killed five people at the 2,600-year-old El-Ghriba synagogue on the island of Djerba after an annual pilgrimage in 2023. Later that year, pro-Palestinian protesters vandalized a historic synagogue and sanctuary in the southern town of El Hamma. And a garden was set ablaze last year outside the synagogue in the coastal city of Sfax.
Tunisia’s recent history was also marked by the self-immolation of a street vendor in 2010 in a protest linked to economic desperation, corruption and repression. Mohamed Bouazizi’s act unleashed mass protests that led to the ouster of Tunisia’s autocratic ruler and uprisings across the region known as the Arab Spring.
‘We cannot forget Sudan’ amid ‘hierarchy of conflicts’: UK FM
- David Lammy: ‘If this was happening on any other continent there would be far more outrage’
- About half of Sudan’s population face acute food insecurity, according to UN
LONDON: The humanitarian catastrophe in Sudan must not be forgotten amid a “hierarchy of conflicts” in the world, the UK’s foreign secretary has warned.
Writing in The Independent, David Lammy called for renewed international attention on the 21-month-long civil war. The humanitarian disaster from the war will be “one of the biggest of our lifetime,” he said.
Since the conflict began in April 2023, almost 4 million people have fled Sudan and fighting has killed more than 15,000, according to conservative estimates.
Lammy visited a refugee camp for displaced Sudanese in neighboring Chad this week. “I bore witness to what will go down in history as one of the biggest humanitarian catastrophes of our lifetimes,” he said.
“The truth no one wants to admit is that if this was happening on any other continent — in Europe, in the Middle East, or in Asia — there would be far more attention from the media — far more outrage. There should be no hierarchy of conflicts, but sadly much of the world acts as if there is one.”
About half of Sudan’s population — more than 24 million people — face acute food insecurity, the latest UN figures show.
The Sudanese Armed Forces and the Rapid Support Forces remain locked in a battle for control of the country and its resources.
Lammy praised the work of the country’s neighbors — including Egypt, Chad and South Sudan — in helping to manage the crisis.
The UN high commissioner for human rights, Volker Turk, warned last week that the war is taking an “even more dangerous turn for civilians.”
On Thursday, the UN Human Rights Office reported that about 120 civilians were killed and more than 150 injured in drone attacks across the city of Omdurman.
Lammy said: “The world cannot continue to shrug its shoulders. There can be no hierarchy of suffering. We cannot forget Sudan.”
The UK has pledged $282 million in aid to almost 800,000 displaced people in Sudan. The funding will supply emergency food assistance and drinking water, among other relief.
