Date: Jan 29, 2019 Source: The Daily Star Bomb blast kills 7 Yemeni civilians in market and U.N. envoy urges combatants to quit Hodeida Yemen truce, prisoner swap timelines pushed back: UN Agence France Presse DUBAI: A bomb attack in a market killed seven Yemeni civilians including a photographer for a UAE television channel in the government-controlled town of Al-Mokha, medics and military sources said Tuesday. At least 20 people were wounded in the overnight blast in the Red Sea town, where pro-government forces backed by the Arab coalition battling the Houthi rebels are based. The improvised explosive device was planted on a motorcycle parked in the middle of the market, an official in the pro-government forces told AFP. Seven people were killed, the official and a hospital source said. A photographer for Abu Dhabi TV, Ziad al-Sharabi, was among the dead, the official Saba news agency quoted Information Minister Moammer al-Eryani as saying. A correspondent for the same network, Faisal al-Zabhani, was among the wounded, he said. There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack, but Saba blamed it on the Houthis. The city of Mokha has enjoyed relative calm since coalition-backed government forces seized it from the rebels in July 2017. U.N.’s Yemen envoy urges combatants to quit Hodeida Reuters DUBAI / LONDON: The United Nations envoy for Yemen Monday urged the warring parties to withdraw their troops from the port of Hodeida quickly, and international aid agencies said that conditions for thousands of starving people were deteriorating fast. Envoy Martin Griffiths acknowledged that proposed timelines on a pullout from the port, the main entry point for Yemen’s commercial and aid imports, had slipped while the country stood on the brink of famine. “The initial timelines were rather ambitious,” he said in comments posted on Twitter. “We are dealing with a complex situation on the ground.” The aid agencies, meeting in London, said people were struggling to feed their children in what had become the world’s worst humanitarian crisis. But more aid was not the only solution to alleviate the suffering of the Yemeni people, said Isabelle Moussard Carlsen of Action Against Hunger. “I think we need to be very clear that we need a political solution to this conflict,” she said. Agreements reached in December between the Iranian-aligned Houthi movement and the Saudi-backed government of Abed Rabbou Mansour Hadi were the first significant breakthrough in four years of conflict which has killed tens of thousands of people through military actions or other causes. But little further progress has been made, risking the unraveling of the peace efforts. The Houthis control Hodeida and troops of the Arab coalition are massed on its outskirts. The warring sides disagree over who should control the city and port after forces withdraw. The truce in Hodeida has largely been respected since coming into force a month ago, but skirmishes continue. Troops have not yet pulled out, missing a Jan. 7 target, and residents and aid workers have told Reuters that barricades, trenches and roadblocks have been reinforced. Although fighting has escalated in other parts of Yemen, U.N. envoy Griffiths said he remained optimistic. “More than any time in the past, there is a political will demonstrated by all parties to put an end to this conflict,” he said. “What we need to see now is the implementation of the provisions of the agreement, fully and rapidly.” The war has been stalemated for years, with the Arab coalition unable to dislodge the Houthi movement that controls the capital Sanaa and most urban centers. The coalition has twice attempted to capture Hodeida port since last year to force the Houthis to negotiate, but held off from a full-blown assault amid fears that a disruption to supply lines would trigger mass starvation. At the London meeting, 14 aid agencies called for action on the humanitarian crisis. “It is what I like to call a prison without walls for the people living in the country at the moment. It is a difficult situation where people are struggling to buy their daily rations to be able to feed their children,” Yemeni Oxfam campaign manager Awssan Kamal told Reuters. Kimberley Brown of the British Red Cross said 85,000 children had lost their lives and malnutrition was taking a huge toll. “I know from my colleagues that the situation is absolutely deteriorating at the moment,” she said. The coalition intervened in 2015 in Yemen to restore Hadi’s government, which was ousted from power by the Houthis in late 2014. The group says its revolution is against corruption. Yemen truce, prisoner swap timelines pushed back: UN Agence France Presse SANAA: The U.N. envoy for Yemen said Monday the expected timeline for a truce in the flashpoint city of Hodeida and a prisoner swap between warring parties had been pushed back. Envoy Martin Griffiths hosted hard-won peace talks between the Yemeni government and Houthi rebels in Sweden last month. The two parties agreed at the talks to a mass prisoner swap and an ambitious cease-fire pact in Hodeida, the Red Sea city home to the impoverished country's most valuable port. Griffiths, who arrived Monday in Sanaa on his third trip to Yemen this month, said there had been "changes in timelines" for both deals. "That momentum is still there, even if we have seen the timelines for implementation extended, both in Hodeida and with regard to the prisoner exchange agreement," he told Saudi-owned newspaper Asharq Al-Awsat. "Yet such changes in timelines are expected, in light of the facts that the timelines were rather ambitious and we are dealing with a complex situation on the ground." Griffiths also confirmed reports retired Dutch general Patrick Cammaert, who heads a monitoring team tasked with overseeing the Hodeida truce, would be replaced. Cammaert arrived Saturday in Yemen. "General Cammaert's plan was to stay in Yemen for a rather short period of time to ... lay the ground for establishing the Hodeida mission," he said. "All the speculations about other reasons for General Patrick's departure are not accurate." The Houthis, who control Hodeida, have accused Cammaert of not being up to the task and of pursuing "other agendas".