Taiz: Saudi-led warplanes launched new strikes in Yemen Wednesday, hours after Riyadh announced a halt to the four-week air campaign, as Al Houthi militiamen seized a key loyalist base in the third city Taiz.
The Saudi-led coalition had warned it stood ready to counter against any advance by the militiamen and their allies even after it ended Operation Storm of Resolve from midnight (2100 GMT Tuesday).
Ground fighting between the militiamen and forces loyal to exiled President Abe Rabbo Mansour Hadi raged on in a string of battleground towns, including the second city of Aden as well as Taiz, in a blow to US-led calls for renewed peace talks.
In Taiz, the militiamen took advantage of the lull in air strikes to overrun the headquarters of the 35th Armoured Brigade, loyal to Hadi, which they had besieged for nearly a week, an army officer said.
The Saudi-led coalition hit back with air strikes against Al Houthi positions inside the captured camp and elsewhere in the city.
The fighting left “dozens dead and wounded”, the officer told AFP.
The World Health Organization says at least 944 people have been killed in Yemen since March 19 and there were calls from all sides for the urgent delivery of humanitarian aid.
Riyadh said the strikes, which it launched on March 26 as the militiamen closed in on Hadi’s last refuge in Aden, had succeeded in eliminating the threat posed to Saudi Arabia and its neighbours by the militiamen’ air and missile capabilities.
But rebel forces remain in control of the capital Sana’a and swathes of the country and Hadi is still in exile in Riyadh, where he fled when the raids began.
The coalition said its operations would now enter a political phase with the focus on the resumption of talks, aid deliveries and “fighting terrorism”.
UN-brokered talks between the warring parties broke down in February when Hadi fled to Aden after Al Houthis seized power in the capital.
Hadi’s ousted predecessor Ali Abdullah Saleh, who has provided key support to Al Houthi militiamen, said he hoped the halt to the air war would lead to a return to dialogue.
“We hope that everyone will cooperate to return to dialogue, to find solutions other than placing losing bets that are wrong and costly,” he said.
Army units which remained loyal to Saleh after his ouster in 2012 following a bloody year-long uprising have provided crucial support to the militiamen in their advance across much of the country.
Iran offered its help in bringing the sides back to the negotiating table.
“Positive developments in Yemen should be followed by urgent humanitarian assistance, intra-Yemeni dialogue & broad-based govt. Ready to help,” Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif tweeted from New York.
In a televised speech from his refuge in Riyadh, Hadi thanked the coalition for its support and refused to give up hope of returning from exile.
“We will soon return to our homeland, to Aden and Sana’a,” he said.
He called on all sides to work to implement a resolution adopted by the UN Security Council last week which imposed an arms embargo on the militiamen but “which paves the way for positive and effective dialogue”.
