UN envoy hopeful for Yemen peace talks

International community fears the offensive on Hodeidah port will aggravate the humanitarian crisis in Yemen.

SANAA - Yemen's warring parties have offered "concrete ideas" to achieve peace, UN envoy Martin Griffiths said on Wednesday after meeting Iran-aligned Huthi leaders in the capital Sanaa.

Griffiths has been conducting shuttle diplomacy in search of a political solution that would avert an all-out military assault on the Huthi-held port city of Hodeidah by a Saudi-led coalition that entered Yemen's conflict in 2015 to try to reinstate the exiled, internationally recognised government.

His efforts have succeeded so far in pausing the offensive launched last month by United Arab Emirates-backed forces to take Hodeidah, a Red Sea port and main conduit for supplies to Huthi-held areas in northern and western Yemen including Sanaa.

The international community fears the offensive on Hodeidah port will aggravate the humanitarian crisis in Yemen and touch off a famine affecting up to 8.4 million people believed by UN officials to be now on the verge of starvation.

"All parties have not only underscored their strong desire for peace, but have also engaged with me on concrete ideas for achieving peace," Griffiths told reporters in Sanaa airport at the end of a three-day visit to the Yemeni capital.

"I am especially thankful to (Huthi leader) Abdel Malek al-Huthi whom I met yesterday (Tuesday) for his support and the fruitful discussion we held," he said.

Griffiths said he would brief the UN Security Council on Thursday on the outcomes of his discussions and that he hoped to meet President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi "very soon", for a second round of talks with his displaced government.

Griffiths gave no details on the "concrete ideas", and there was no immediate comment from the two sides.

Last week, Griffiths met Hadi in Aden in south Yemen, the temporary headquarters of the exiled government.

UN efforts may face a major challenge over the control of Hodeidah city and its port.

The Huthis have offered to hand over management of the port to the United Nations as part of an overall ceasefire in Hodeidah province. The Arab coalition says Huthi combatants must leave Yemen's western coast entirely, including Hodeidah city, but the Huthis have already said they would not withdraw.

Pause in advance

Yemeni government forces backed by the Saudi-led coalition have bombarded rebel positions outside Hodeidah since pausing their push into the city.

With the Huthis building up their defences inside Hodeidah to repel any advance, more civilians fled the city itself.

According to military sources, both sides were bringing in reinforcements.

Hospital sources and local residents said 11 civilians and 43 rebel fighters were killed on Sunday and Monday as the rebels came under fire south of Hodeidah and in Huthi retaliatory action.

The rebels have held Hodeidah since 2014, but government forces backed by the UAE and other coalition troops launched a major assault last month, capturing the disused airport on its southern outskirts -- a major stepping stone for any push into the city.

On Saturday, the government and the UAE announced a pause in their advance.

This week's deadly bombardment targeted rebel positions in Tohayta, Beit al-Faqiya and Zabid, to the south of Hodeidah, government military sources said.

Three civilians were killed in their car in a coalition air strike targeting rebel military vehicles on a road near Zabid, residents said.

Eight civilians, including four children, died in a rocket attack on Tohayta, witnesses said, with residents saying it was carried out by the rebels.

Fleeing by motorcycle

Civilians from Hodeidah were seen fleeing -- loading suitcases, foam mattresses and sacks of basic provisions onto the back of pick-up trucks.

Journalists sighted families squeezed onto motorcycles, and other civilians fleeing in minibuses and other vehicles.

Some pick-up trucks were so overloaded that the men clung onto the back rails and stood on bumpers while the women and children sat inside.

Portraits of Saleh al-Sammad, a Huthi political chief killed in a coalition strike in April, gazed down from lampposts in litter-strewn streets outside the city.

Many civilians have already fled frontline areas.

An elderly woman interviewed said she had abandoned her home just south of Hodeidah for the relative safety of the city.

"I refuse to go out. I'm still here crying when I sleep and crying when I wake up," she said.

Another resident, Mohammed Ali, said that many others had been unable to flee.

"There are a lot of people still stuck in some villages without any aid. The human rights organisations have to help them," he said.

The head of the UN children's agency warned Tuesday that fears over the collapse of Yemen's healthcare and education systems had in essence materialised.

"The worry about collapse has now passed beyond that," said UNICEF chief Henrietta Fore, noting that many health workers and teachers had now gone unpaid for two years.

Hodeidah is the latest battlefront in Yemen's war that has killed nearly 10,000 people since 2015, including 2,200 children, pushing the impoverished country to the brink of famine.

Desperately needed relief supplies and three quarters of Yemen's commercial imports pass through the port in the city, which has a population of 600,000.

The Saudi-led coalition stressed that the vital port has remained operational during its campaign in Hodeidah, and that a further five ships had docked there on Tuesday, with six others waiting in the vicinity. Coalition spokesman Turki Al Malki added that the coalition had issued a permit for a further eight ships en route to Yemen

Griffiths has said a proposal to grant the UN a major role in managing the port is under study.

But the government and the UAE have demanded the rebels withdraw unconditionally from the whole city, not just the port, a condition the rebels have rejected.

The UAE accuses the rebels of smuggling in weapons through the port, while Saudi Arabia has accused them of targeting Saudi cities with missiles supplied by Iran.

The Huthis deny accusations that they are proxies of Iran in a regional struggle for dominance with the Saudis, saying they are fighting rampant corruption and foreign invaders in the Arabian Peninsula state.