Yemen proposes new prisoner swap with Saudi-led coalition

Yemen’s National Salvation Government has proposed a new prisoner swap with the Saudi-led coalition, amid a delay in the implementation of a previously agreed prisoner exchange deal.

According to Press TV, Abdul Qader al-Murtada, the Head of the National Committee for Prisoner Affairs, said on Sunday the offer stipulates “the release of 200 prisoners from each side before Eid al-Fitr”, which will begin next week.

He noted that the offer was submitted to the Saudi-led coalition through the United Nations.

The official said Yemen was waiting for the coalition’s response that it hopes would be “positive”.

Last month, Yemen’s prisoner affairs committee announced that a prisoner exchange deal was agreed between the warring parties under which 1,400 prisoners from the Yemeni AArmy and popular committees would be released in return for 823 from the other side, including 16 Saudis and three Sudanese.

The United Nations brokered a truce between the coalition and Yemen’s popular Ansarullah resistance movement earlier this month.

In line with the agreement, the coalition agreed to end its attacks on the Yemeni soil that it began in March 2015 with the goal of changing Yemen’s power structure in favor of the country’s former Saudi-allied officials.

The coalition also agreed to end a simultaneous siege that it has been enforcing against Yemen.

In a blow to the ceasefire agreement, Saudi Arabia on Sunday refused to issue a permit for the first commercial flight from Yemen’s capital city of Sana’a in six years, which was supposed to take passengers needing medical care.

Ansarullah Spokesman Mohammed Abdul-Salam said the move proves the coalition’s “lack of seriousness about peace".

ME