Sanaa, September 06: Yemen rebels on Sunday denied government accusations that they had broken a truce and said authorities were using humanitarian issues as a pretext to press ahead with attacks against them in the north of the country.
Yemen said on Saturday the northern rebels reignited fighting in Saada province by breaking a truce designed to allow access for humanitarian aid.
In August, a new wave of fighting erupted between rebel Shi’ite Muslims of the Zaydi sect and government forces trying to impose central authority. The conflict first began in 2004.
“The continued attacks on villages immediately after its declaration (shows) that it (the government) is not seeking to stop the war, but trying to deceive and exploit the issue of the displaced people and deliver military supplies to sites besieged in the provinces of Saada and Amran,” said a statement from the office of the opposition group’s leader Abdul-Malik al-Houthi.
Both sides have previously rejected ceasefire offers by the other party.
U.N. aid agencies say more than 100,000 people, many of them children, have fled their homes during the surge in fighting. They launched an appeal in Geneva this week for $23.5 million to help Yemen.
Thousands are thought to be staying in tented camps. Information about the conflict has been hard to verify because northern provinces have been closed to media.
Earlier on Sunday, a local source from Saada province said six women and 10 children had been executed by “terrorist elements” and Houthi fighters for cooperating with government forces. The Houthis did not immediately respond to the claims.
Yemen, one of the poorest Arab countries, has been battling the rebellion in the north as well as a wave of al Qaeda attacks and rising secessionist sentiment in the south.
The northern rebels have accused the government of using Saudi weaponry, issuing video footage of mortars bearing Saudi emblems.
Riyadh is worried instability in Yemen could allow militants to relaunch operations in Saudi Arabia.
The rebels published footage on Sunday that showed what they said were captured government buildings and burned out tanks. The government also said on Sunday it had killed four rebels in separate attacks against authorities.
—Agencies