News / Yemen

Yemen sides agree to reinforce Hudaydah ceasefire

Monday, 15 July 2019 11:13 PM [ Last Update: Monday, 15 July 2019 11:13 PM ]

File photo shows a general view of the al-Hudaydah port in western Yemen.

The warring sides in Yemen have agreed to take measures towards invigorating a standing ceasefire over al-Hudaydah, a key western port taking in the majority of the violence-racked country’s imports.

"They agreed on a mechanism and new measures to reinforce the ceasefire and de-escalation, to be put in place as soon as possible," the United Nations said in a statement on Monday, according to Reuters.

Yemen’s former government resigned in 2015 amid a political stalemate and its head Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi, a close friend of Saudi Arabia, fled to the kingdom’s capital Riyadh.

Soon afterwards, the kingdom and its allies launched an invasion of the impoverished country to restore power to the former officials. The invasion has lasted ever since, killing tens of thousands and forcing entire Yemen close to the brink of countrywide famine.

The United Nations brokered the truce in Stockholm in December 2018 between members of the former government and Yemen’s popular Houthi Ansarullah movement, which has been defending the nation against the invaders.

The agreement came as a blockade of al-Hudaydah by the Saudi-led coalition was threatening to worsen the situation in Yemen -- already judged as the scene of the world’s worst humanitarian crisis.

Under the deal, the two sides agreed to withdraw their forces from Hudaydah's main port and two other nearby ports. Ansarullah’s fighters unilaterally pulled out of the ports last month to facilitate implementation of the accord.

The UN statement noted that the two sides had met as members of the "Redeployment Coordination Committee," a body set up by the world body and chaired by Danish Lieutenant General Michael Lollesgaard to oversee ceasefire and troop pullout.