Yemen peace talks in Oman next week; 16 killed in air strikes

9/12/2015 10:43:41 PM

(MENAFN- The Peninsula)Yemeni children sit amid the rubble of houses destroyed in air strikes carried out by the Saudi-led coalition in Sana’a yesterday.

SANA’A: At least 16 Yemeni civilians including ten people from a single family were killed in nationwide air strikes by a Saudi-led military coalition yesterday medics in three provinces said.

Gulf Arab countries have stepped up their air attacks targeting the Houthi movement allied to Iran after the group killed at least 60 Arab troops deployed to Yemen in a missile attack on their base last Friday.

The raids pummelled the Houthi-controlled capital Sana’a and the southern city of Taiz which is being fought over in heavy street battles between Houthi fighters and Gulf-backed Yemeni forces.

Two civilians were killed in the capital and ten people from one family died in Taiz. Eyewitnesses said the strikes appeared to target the houses of political leaders allied to the Houthis.

Four more people were killed near Yemen’s border with Saudi Arabia in the far northern province of Saada.

The Arab alliance has said it seeks to avoid civilian deaths in the five-month war aimed at restoring Yemen’s exiled government and warding off suspected Iranian influence in the Arab world.

Condemning the strikes as war crimes the Houthis deny being beholden to Tehran and accuse the government and its Arab allies as pawns of the West.

More than 4500 people have been killed in fighting and air strikes and the conflict looks set to continue as Arab states have stationed thousands of troops in Yemen ahead of a planned push toward Sana’a.

Yemen’s warring factions will meet for peace talks in neighbouring Oman next week the United Nations and Yemeni officials said. The talks are the second major negotiations effort aimed at ending the war. Reuters

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