Race To Broker Truce As Yemen Talks Enter Final Hours

Rimbo, Sweden, (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 13th Dec, 2018 ) :With just hours left before the close of negotiations, UN mediators rushed to broker a truce Wednesday between government representatives and rebels in Yemen, a country teetering on the brink of famine.

The UN talks, which opened last week in Sweden, mark the first meeting in two years between Yemen's Huthi rebels and the government of President Abedrabbo Mansour Hadi, backed since 2015 by a behemoth military coalition led by Saudi Arabia.

Taiz, the southwestern city controlled by the government and surrounded by the rebels, is no longer under discussion at the talks, scheduled to close on Thursday.

The city has been the scene of some of the most intense fighting in a war that has pushed 14 million people to the brink of famine.

Intense talks, however, were continuing on Sanaa airport, shut down for years in the conflict between the Saudi-backed government and northern rebels linked to Iran.

Negotiators are also seeking a de-escalation of violence in rebel-held Hodeida, a port city vital to the supply of humanitarian aid, and a cooperation deal on the country's crumbling economy.