(Reuters) – Two delegations from the Saudi-led coalition fighting in Yemen and the Iran-aligned Houthis exchanged visits to prisoners of war on Wednesday as a gesture of goodwill and a confidence-building measure to extend the truce in Yemen, the coalition said in a statement carried by the Saudi state news agency SPA.
The statement quoted spokesman Colonel Turki al-Malki as saying “this visit is humanitarian in nature … and comes as one of the gains of the truce as we seek to extend it.”
The United Nations is pressing for an extended and expanded truce that would build on the two-month one that expired on Oct. 2 after being rolled over twice, and which has brought the longest stretch of relative calm in the seven-year conflict.
The Saudi-led coalition intervened in March 2015 after the Houthis ousted the internationally recognized government from the capital, Sanaa. The group says it is fighting a corrupt system and foreign aggression.
The conflict has killed tens of thousands and caused a dire humanitarian crisis that has pushed millions into hunger.
(Reporting by Lilian Wagdy and Mahmoud Mourad; Editing by Chris Reese)
