Ansarullah leader says Riyadh will be regretful if it misses three-day truce opportunity to end war

The leader of Yemen’s popular Ansarullah resistance movement has urged the Riyadh regime to seize on the movement's announcement of a three-day truce with the Saudi-led coalition to immediately halt all military operations and brutal siege against the impoverished country.

Abdul-Malik al-Houthi made the remarks in a televised speech broadcast live from the Yemeni capital city of Sana’a on Monday afternoon as he addressed clerics and religious scholars ahead of the holy Muslim fasting month of Ramadan.

“There is no chance for the countries waging aggression against Yemen to escape our retaliatory attacks, and get out of the current predicament unless they end the onslaught, lift the all-out blockade and end occupation,” Houthi pointed out.

The Ansarullah chief warned the Saudi-led coalition against losing the opportunity provided by the three-day truce, calling on Saudi Arabia and its allies to agree to a permanent ceasefire. “You will be regretful if you miss the chance,” Houthi said.

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“We will spare no effort to confront [the Saudi-led] aggression and economic blockade with all available means. We will not allow the siege against Yemen to continue in any way,” the Ansarullah leader highlighted.

“The eighth year of Yemen war started with Operation Breaking the Siege III, which made headlines worldwide. We will fight off the blockade, and God willing will target the aggressor countries until they are forced to lift the siege,” Houthi noted.

On Saturday evening, Chairman of Yemen’s Supreme Political Council Mahdi al-Mashat announced the suspension of retaliatory missile and drone attacks and all military actions against Saudi Arabia for a period of three days.

“This is a sincere invitation and practical step to rebuild trust and take all the sides from the arena of talks to the arena of acts,” Mashat said.

“And we are ready to turn this declaration into a final and permanent commitment in the event that Saudi Arabia commits to ending the siege and stopping its raids on Yemen once and for all,” he added.

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The truce came a day after a wave of drone and missile attacks hit targets across Saudi Arabia.

The spokesman for Yemeni armed forces said in a statement aired by the Arabic-language al-Masirah television network that Yemeni troops had carried out a large-scale offensive, dubbed Operation Breaking the Siege III, against a number of vital and sensitive targets deep inside Saudi Arabia, using domestically-developed ballistic and winged missiles as well as combat drones.

Brigadier General Yahya Saree stated that Yemeni troops and their allies pounded high-value sites in the Saudi capital Riyadh, energy facilities in the strategic Jizan and Najran regions, as well as an Aramco fuel distribution station in the Red Sea port city of Jeddah among others.

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Saudi state media also reported a string of drone and rocket attacks by Yemeni forces on targets in the city of Jeddah.

“A number of bomb-laden drones targeted the oil refineries in Ras Tanura and Rabigh, as well as the Aramco oil facilities in Jizan and Najran. A barrage of winged missiles targeted Aramco oil facilities in Jeddah and  vital facilities in the Saudi capital Riyadh,” he said.

The spokesman for Yemeni armed forces added that important targets in the southern cities of Dhahran al-Janub, Abha and Khamis Mushait were also hit with a high numbers of ballistic missiles.

Saree highlighted that Yemeni troops will conduct more qualitative strikes with the intent to break the crippling Saudi-led siege, emphasizing they will not hesitate to expand their military operations until the Saudi-led aggression stops and the blockade is completely lifted.

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Saudi Arabia launched the devastating war against Yemen in March 2015 in collaboration with a number of its allies and with arms and logistics support from the US and several Western states.

The objective was to bring back to power the former Riyadh-backed regime and crush the popular Ansarullah resistance movement, which has been running state affairs in the absence of an effective government in Yemen.

The war has stopped short of all of its goals, despite killing hundreds of thousands of Yemenis and turning the entire country into the scene of the world’s worst humanitarian crisis.

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