Yemen combatants start talks in Jordan on prisoner deal

AMMAN — Yemen's warring sides started talks on Wednesday in the Amman about a deal to free thousands of prisoners as part of UN-led peace efforts, two UN sources said. 

Delegates from the Iran-aligned Houthi movement and the Saudi-backed Yemeni government had arrived in Amman earlier. They will discuss the implementation of a deal agreed in UN-led talks in Sweden in December that would allow thousands of families to be reunited.

"The meetings of the two sides with us began," a UN source not authorised to speak publicly told Reuters.

A day earlier, the foreign ministry announced that Jordan has accepted a request from UN Special Envoy for Yemen Martin Griffiths to host a meeting between Yemen's warring parties for talks on a prisoner-swap deal, stopping short of disclosing the date for the meeting.

The ministry stressed that “Jordan fully supports all efforts seeking a political solution to the Yemeni conflict within the relevant international framework”.

Western nations, some of which supply arms and intelligence to a Saudi-led coalition backing the government, had pressed the two sides to agree confidence-building steps to pave the way for a wider truce and a political process to end the war, which has killed tens of thousands of people.