Yemen’s warring parties agree on biggest prisoner exchange deal so far

By Mohammed Tawfeeq, CNN

(CNN) — Yemen’s Houthi rebels and the Saudi-backed Yemeni government have reached a new agreement to carry out a large-scale prisoner exchange, marking a significant humanitarian step amid ongoing efforts to de-escalate the conflict.

Abdulqader Hasan Yahya al-Murtadha, head of the Houthi National Committee for Prisoners’ Affairs, said on Tuesday that the deal includes the release of around 1,700 Houthi detainees in exchange for 1,200 prisoners held by the other side, among them seven Saudi nationals and 23 Sudanese.

Saudi Arabia’s ambassador to Yemen, Mohamed Al-Jabir, said the agreement was signed under the supervision of the United Nations special envoy for Yemen and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC). In a post on X, Al-Jabir described the agreement as an important confidence-building measure.

The UN special envoy’s office said in a statement on Tuesday that the agreement was reached at the conclusion of a 12-day meeting in Muscat, Oman.

The UN special envoy, Hans Grundberg, said the agreement was a “positive and meaningful step that will hopefully ease the suffering of detainees and their families across Yemen.”

Prisoner exchanges have been one of the few areas where Yemen’s warring sides have made tangible progress. The agreement reached Tuesday will result in the largest prisoner exchange between the two parties so far. In October 2020, more than 1,000 prisoners were released following UN-backed talks in Switzerland. Another major exchange took place in April 2023, when the ICRC facilitated the release and transfer of 973 detainees linked to the conflict.

Yemen’s civil war began in 2014, when Houthi forces seized the capital, Sanaa, ousting the internationally recognized government. The conflict escalated in 2015 after a Saudi-led coalition intervened. Despite years of fighting, the Houthis continue to control large parts of the country. A UN-brokered ceasefire signed in 2022 later expired, but the parties have so far avoided a return to full-scale war, with humanitarian measures such as prisoner exchanges remaining a key channel for dialogue.

The conflict has resulted in the deaths of around 377,000 people, according to a 2021 report by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), more than half of whom died from indirect causes associated with the conflict, such as lack of food, water and health care.

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