US Secretary of State John Kerry says he's agreed in talks with Gulf Arab states and the United Nations in Saudi Arabia on a plan to restart peace talks on Yemen with a goal of forming a unity government.
UN-sponsored negotiations to end 18 months of fighting in the impoverished country on Saudi Arabia's southern border collapsed this month and the dominant Iran-allied Houthi movement there resumed shelling attacks into the kingdom.
Speaking at a press conference with his Saudi counterpart Adel al-Jubeir in the Saudi city of Jeddah, Kerry said the conflict in which the kingdom has launched thousands of air strikes in favour of the exiled government had gone on too long and needed to end.
Kerry said the Houthis must cease shelling across the border with Saudi Arabia, pull back from the capital Sanaa which they took control of two years ago, cede their weapons and enter into a unity government with their domestic foes.
Yemen's internationally recognised government, based in Saudi Arabia, has made similar demands but insisted that the Houthis fulfil all those measures before any new government was formed. However Kerry suggested they could move ahead in parallel.
"We agreed on a renewed approach to negotiations with both a security and political track simultaneously working in order to provide a comprehensive settlement," Kerry said.
"The final agreement ... would include in the first phase a swift formation of a new national unity government, the withdrawal of forces from Sanaa and other areas and the transfer of all heavy weapons including ballistic missiles, from the Houthis and forces aligned to them to a third party."
The reference to handing weapons to a third party also appeared to be a departure from the government demands.
"This leaves nothing for future speculation," Kerry said. "This has a clarity to it about how confidence can be built, what the end game looks like, and how the parties get there."
Jubeir said Saudi Arabia and the United States had agreed a way forward for Yemen and said the UN envoy to Yemen would take it up with the parties.
Saudi Arabia, a key U.S. ally, has come under stiff criticism from rights groups for air strikes that have repeatedly killed civilians in Yemen.
The Yemen war has killed more than 6500 people and displaced some 3 million.
The United Nations human rights office said in report on Thursday that the Saudi-led coalition was responsible for 60 per cent of the 3799 civilians killed in the war.
Saudi Arabia and its allies view the Houthis, who hail from a branch of Shi'ite Islam, as proxies of their archrival Iran.
The Houthis deny this and say the exiled government and the Saudis are imperialist pawns of the West bent on dominating Yemen and excluding them from power.
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