Clashes, raids kill 32 rebels

Fresh clashes and air strikes have killed 32 rebels around Yemen's Red Sea city of Hodeida, hospital sources said yesterday, as the UN envoy kept up peace efforts in Sanaa.

A military source told AFP the Saudi-led coalition fighting alongside the Yemeni government against Shia Huthi rebels carried out an air raid on a radio station tower in the port city of Hodeida.

Three people died in yesterday's raid, he said, while Huthi-run Al-Masirah television said four people were killed, three security guards and a station employee.

According to medical sources in Hodeida province, which is controlled by the Huthis, a total of 32 insurgents were killed and 14 others wounded in clashes and air strikes since Saturday.

The coalition accuses the Tehran-aligned Huthis of smuggling arms from Iran through Hodeida and has imposed a partial blockade on the port, which the rebels seized in 2014.

The UN's Yemen envoy, Martin Griffiths, arrived yesterday in the rebel-held capital Sanaa, without making any statement to the media.

Griffiths is pushing for new peace talks after a failed attempt to bring the two sides together in Geneva earlier this month.

Saudi Arabia and its allies intervened in 2015 in the conflict between embattled Yemeni President Abedrabbo Mansour Hadi, whose government is recognised by the United Nations, and the Huthis.

Nearly 10,000 people have since been killed and the country now stands on the brink of famine.