An exchange of more than 800 prisoners from Yemen's war held by the Houthi rebels and the Saudi-led coalition battling them has begun, the International Committee for the Red Cross says.
Catch up on the developing stories making headlines.An exchange of more than 800 prisoners from Yemen's war held by the Houthi rebels and the Saudi-led coalition battling them began Friday, the International Committee for the Red Cross said. The United Nations-brokered deal, in the works for months, comes amid concerted diplomatic efforts to negotiate an end to the conflict.
The three-day operation is the most significant prisoner exchange in Yemen since both sides freed more than 1,000 detainees in October 2020. Thousands of people are believed to be held as prisoners of war by all sides since the war erupted. The war has killed more than 150,000 people, including fighters and civilians, and created one of the world’s worst humanitarian disasters.
The deal tentatively calls for the Houthis to release more than 180 prisoners, including Saudi and Sudanese troops fighting with the Saudi-led coalition, and four Yemeni journalists. The journalists were detained in recent years and sentenced to death by a Houthi-controlled court in a trial described by Amnesty International as “grossly unfair.”
Saudi Arabia has already freed 13 Houthi detainees who returned to Sanaa on April 9 ahead of a trip by Saudi ambassador to Yemen, Mohammed bin Saeed al-Jaber, to the Yemeni capital. Including those detainees, the deal will see a total of 869 prisoners released, the Red Cross says.
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