The United Nations' envoy for Yemen said on Friday after meeting with Houthi forces in Oman that he hoped to announce a ceasefire in the conflict in the next few days.
Yemen's higher political council, which was formed by the armed Houthi movement and supporters of former president Ali Abdullah Saleh, has appointed Abdulaziz bin Habtoor to form a national salvation government, Saba news agency said on Sunday.
Houthi rebels in Yemen are posing a threat to shipping in the strategic Bab al-Mandab strait, the Saudi-led coalition supporting the government said Sunday after an attack on an Emirati vessel.
Arab coalition forces have launched operations against militia boats of Yemen's Houthi group that struck a civilian logistics ship on a humanitarian voyage in a strategic Red Sea shipping lane, the Saudi-led alliance said.
Forces allied to Yemen's Houthi group attacked across the border into Saudi Arabia's southern Jizan province on Thursday, with both sides claiming victory in the skirmish and giving conflicting accounts of of casualties.
At least 16 members of the extended family of a Yemeni mosque imam were killed in an air strike on their family home in northern Yemen by the Saudi-led Arab coalition, a Reuters witness, a medic and a resident said.
US Secretary of State John Kerry on Thursday announced a fresh international peace initiative for Yemen aimed at forming a unity government to resolve its 17-month-old conflict.
A newly-formed governing council in Yemen could work with Russia to "fight terrorism" by allowing Moscow use of the war-torn country's military bases, Yemen's former president said on Sunday.
The Saudi-led coalition fighting rebels in Yemen said on Friday it wanted urgent talks with Doctors Without Borders (MSF) over the charity's withdrawal of staff from six hospitals in the war-torn country.
Yemeni army forces backed by Arab coalition aircraft killed about 40 suspected al Qaeda fighters on Sunday as they fought their way into two militant strongholds in eastern Yemen, a local official and residents said.
Saudi-led air strikes on a school in a rebel-held province of Yemen have killed 10 children, aid agencies said on Sunday, prompting fresh concerns over civilian casualties in the 17-month war.
At least 10 children were killed and 21 were injured in northern Yemen on Saturday, aid group Medecins Sans Frontieres said, in what the country's dominant Houthi group said was a Saudi-led air strike on a school.
