Yemen's government said Friday it will join UN-mediated peace talks next week, as rocket fire from Iran-backed rebels reportedly killed 20 civilians and wounded dozens more in a busy market. Meanwhile, the Saudi-led coalition sent new reinforcements over the border into Yemen in preparation for an offensive to retake the capital, seized by the Shia Houthi insurgents a year ago.
And, in an ongoing campaign to soften up Sanaa, coalition warplanes struck an arms depot, triggering powerful explosions that killed at least seven civilians and wounded 10, witnesses and medics said. International rights groups have repeatedly voiced alarm at the heavy civilian toll in the conflict, which the United Nations estimates has killed more than 4,500 people since March.
An AFP reporter at the Wadia border crossing from Saudi Arabia saw at least 40 vehicles cross into Yemen's oil-rich Marib province in part of the operation to recapture more territory from the Houthis, who swept southwards after taking Sanaa. Since July, loyalists have recaptured the main port of Aden and four other southern provinces.
The vehicles were carrying Yemeni troops trained in Saudi Arabia as well as coalition soldiers whose nationality military officials declined to give. Their arrival came as warplanes killed seven rebels in the eastern province of Marib, while other raids struck insurgent positions in neighbouring Shabwa province, military sources said.
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