Hundreds freed on second day of Houthi-Saudi prisoner swap

Kathmandu: Saudi Arabia and the Yemeni Houthi rebels have freed hundreds of people on the second day of war prisoner swap deal amid concerted efforts to end Yemen’s eight-year-old war, according to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).

Saturday’s first flight left the southern Saudi city of Abha for Yemen’s Houthi-held capital Sanaa with 120 Houthi rebel prisoners, ICRC public affairs and media adviser Jessica Moussan said.

It was followed by a flight from Sanaa to Riyadh carrying 20 former detainees, among them 16 Saudis and three Sudanese, according to the state-affiliated Al Ekhbariya channel.

On Friday, 318 prisoners were transported on Friday on four flights between government-controlled Aden and the rebel-held capital, Sanaa, reuniting with their families before next week’s Muslim holiday of Eid al-Fitr.

Standing on the tarmac at Sanaa International Airport, Mohammed al-Darwi, a Houthi prisoner released in the exchange, told Al Jazeera, ‘We are happy to return to Sanaa after we were in the prisons of the enemy.’

The exchange of war prisoners came after warring parties struck a deal at negotiations in Switzerland last month to free nearly 900 detainees. The deal was overseen by the United Nations envoy for Yemen, Hans Grundberg, and the ICRC. The next meeting of the warring party will be held in May to discuss further releases.

The ongoing exchange is a confidence-building measure coinciding with an intense diplomatic push to end Yemen’s war, which has left hundreds of thousands of dead from the fighting and led to crisis like hunger and a lack of access to health care.