Today, Friday, the Yemeni government and the Houthis completed a two-stage prisoner exchange process, in which 1,081 Yemeni prisoners were released, in addition to Saudis and Sudanese, under the supervision of the United Nations and the International Committee of the Red Cross, while the parties to the conflict confirmed the continuation of negotiations to release all prisoners on both sides.
A Red Cross plane arrived in Sanaa carrying 104 of the 200 Houthi prisoners who were being held by the Yemeni government forces.
Yesterday, the government and the coalition released 470 Houthi prisoners.
In the city of Ma'rib, thousands of Yemenis received more than 200 prisoners and detainees who supported the Yemeni government, and thousands gathered at the entrance to the city of Ma'rib to receive those coming from the airport in the city of Seiyun, chanting slogans calling for the release of thousands of others in Houthi prisons.
Among the released are 5 journalists who have been kidnapped by the Houthis for more than 5 years, 15 Saudis and 4 Sudanese.
This operation comes as part of the prisoner exchange agreement signed between the Houthis and the Yemeni government in Switzerland.
The agreement is part of a broader agreement the two sides signed in Stockholm in December 2018.
The International Committee of the Red Cross confirmed - in a statement - the completion of the exchange process, which it described as the largest operation of its kind since the beginning of the war in Yemen.
The International Committee of the Red Cross said it hoped the prisoner exchange move between the parties to the Yemeni conflict would support efforts to release more detainees in the future.
The head of the ICRC delegation in Yemen said that after a thousand families benefited from the return of their relatives, hundreds of other families were waiting for their reunification.
The UN envoy to Yemen, Martin Griffiths, told the Security Council on Thursday that the exchange process was "an air bridge to hope," adding that the two sides were still negotiating a permanent ceasefire, and hoped to reach it before the end of the year.
For his part, a member of the governmental committee for prisoners' affairs, Majed Fadayel, confirmed to the French press that "we have an upcoming round of negotiations at the end of this year for the rest of the prisoners and kidnapped by the Houthis."
According to Fadayel, "the next deal will include 4 state leaders," including Brigadier General Nasser Mansour Hadi, brother of Yemeni President Abd Rabbu Mansour Hadi.
On the other hand, Houthi spokesman Muhammad Abdul Salam wrote in a tweet on Twitter, "We will continue discussion, dialogue and negotiation for the release of the rest ... until the release of all prisoners and detainees."
The two warring sides agreed in 2018 to exchange 15,000 prisoners to pave the way for political negotiations to end the conflict, but little progress has been made.
Yemen has descended into the furnace of war since the Houthis ousted the internationally recognized government from power in Sanaa in late 2014, prompting the Saudi-Emirati coalition to intervene in the conflict.