Saudi-led coalition frees Yemen rebels in peace gesture

The official Saudi Press Agency said on Twitter that process had begun, adding there would be "three stages of air transport of prisoners" to Yemen's Houthi-controlled capital Sanaa and the southern port city of Aden

The Saudi-led military coalition fighting Yemen's Houthi insurgents announced on May 6 that it was freeing a batch of rebel prisoners, part of what it says are efforts to end the seven-year war. Last week, the coalition said it would release 163 prisoners it accused of participating in "hostilities" against Saudi Arabia.

The official Saudi Press Agency said on Twitter on Friday that process had begun, adding there would be "three stages of air transport of prisoners" to Yemen's Houthi-controlled capital Sanaa and the southern port city of Aden.

It did not say how many prisoners would be let go, but a spokesman for the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) told AFP the organisation was "facilitating the transfer of more than 100 Yemeni former detainees from Saudi Arabia to Yemen".

The spokesman, Basheer Omar, said there would be three ICRC flights from the Saudi city of Abha to Aden. The conflict pits Yemen's Saudi-backed government, officially based in Aden, against the Iran-aligned Houthis.

It has killed hundreds of thousands of people and pushed the Arab world's poorest country to the brink of famine. It has also featured Houthi strikes on neighbouring Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, another member of the coalition.

But a renewable two-month truce that went into effect in early April has provided a rare respite from violence in much of the country and has seen oil tankers begin arriving at the port of Hodeida, potentially easing fuel shortages in Sanaa and elsewhere.

The truce also involved a deal to resume commercial flights out of Sanaa's airport for the first time in six years and to open main roads leading into the besieged Yemeni city of Taez — though neither step has been taken so far.