Yemeni resistance makes gains against Houthis

Yemen’s Southern Popular Resistance took control of the main street in the city of Taez as clashes with Houthi militiamen continued, a day after the Iran-backed militia breached a U.N.-brokered humanitarian ceasefire, Al Arabiya News Channel reported.

Several people were killed in Taez as Houthi militia shelled civilian areas. Shortly after, the Saudi-led coalition conducted a series of strikes that killed a number of militants.

The spokesman for the Yemeni military council said the army, backed by members of the Southern Popular Resistance, took control of the Siteen Street in Taez, prompting the Houthis to intensify shelling in areas held by the resistance.

The U.N.-brokered pause in the fighting was meant to last a week to allow aid deliveries to the country’s 21 million people who have endured more than three months of bombing and civil war.

A coalition of Arab states has been bombing the Iranian-allied Houthi militias since late March in a bid to restore to power President Abd Rabbu Mansour Hadi, who has fled to Riyadh.

Separately, the Saudi-led coalition fighting Yemen’s Houthi militia said on Saturday it had not received a request from the Yemeni government in exile to pause its aerial campaign during a truce brokered by the United Nations, Al Arabiya News Channel reported.

“The leadership of the coalition: we did not receive a request from the Yemeni government regarding the truce,” read a news flash aired on the channel Saturday.

Coalition spokesman Brigadier-General Ahmed al-Assiri said the bloc was “not concerned with this truce because it does not provide a commitment from the Houthi militia.”

The report came after Saudi-led air strikes and heavy shelling between warring factions shook several cities in Yemen overnight.