Jemen

US official says White House holding talks with Iran-backed rebels for first time in over four years, ‘narrowly focused’ on ending conflict.

All parties to the war in Yemen are committing horrific abuses, from arbitrary killings to rape and torture, with an impunity that underscores a collective failure of the international community, a panel of international experts said on Tuesday.

Yemen’s anti-Huthi coalition has begun to splinter, with sharp fighting between Saudi- and Emirati-backed elements in the country’s south. With UN assistance, the Gulf monarchies should urgently broker a ceasefire as a prelude to an expanded peace process encompassing southern secessionists and others now excluded.

The situation in Yemen is “very fragile”, the top United Nations humanitarian official there has warned, noting that as many as 13 people have been killed and at least 70 wounded over the past three days during clashes in two governorates.

Yemen government forces on Wednesday captured Aden airport from southern separatists and attacked the city’s eastern suburbs, residents and officials said, in renewed fighting that deepened a rift between supposed allies in a Saudi-led coalition.

Washington is looking to prod Saudi Arabia into taking part in secret talks in Oman.

The United Nations describes the situation in Yemen as the world's worst humanitarian crisis.

One month ago, the United Nations top Yemen envoy told the Security Council the country was facing “a crucial moment” in the course of its long and bloody conflict, and on Tuesday, he again urged members to acknowledge that recent infighting around the Government stronghold of Aden were “a clear sign” that the conflict must be brought to a swift, peaceful end.

[…] The fighting between the two sides — ostensible allies in the Saudi-led coalition that for years has been fighting Yemen's Iran-backed Houthi rebels, based in the north — has added another layer to the complex civil war in the Arab world's most impoverished country.

Yemen’s southern separatists vowed to keep control over Aden, warning the only way out of the impasse that has fractured a Saudi-led military alliance was for Islamists and northerners to be removed from positions of power in the south. The separatists, supported by coalition member the United Arab Emirates, effectively took over Aden, the temporary seat of the Saudi-backed Yemeni government, over the weekend.