(Transcript from World News Radio)
Thousands of Yemenis have taken to the streets of the capital, Sanaa, calling for an end to ongoing airstrikes led by Saudi Arabia.
Residents say despite an announced end to the airstrikes, jets are continuing to attack Iran-allied Houthi militiamen and rebel army units.
Aid agencies say the promised lull in strikes to allow relief into the country never came, and now the humanitarian situation in Yemen has become catastrophic.
Rachael Hocking reports.
(Click on the audio tab above to hear the full report)
Chanting Houthi slogans, protesters call on the Saudis to end airstrikes on the country as Iran-allied Houthi militiamen exercise their growing influence.
"We're here to show the Saudis and the aggressors that we are still alive, and we'll continue to stay alive. The blood that's been spilled so far will be the final nail in the coffin of the Saudi royal family."
Another protestor expresses similar thoughts.
"We came out today to condem the continuing aggression under another name that is sponsored by Zionist-America along with Saudi idiocy. This targets the people of the world."
Their demands come after Yemeni Foreign Minister Riyadh Yaseen rejected a call for peace talks issued by former president Ali Abdullah Saleh.
Mr Saleh, whose loyalists have been fighting alongside the Houthi rebels who forced the central government into exile, called for Yemenis to return to political dialogue to find a way to end the country's conflict.
But Foreign Minister Yaseen says peace talks cannot happen until Houthis withdraw from the cities they are occupying.
Meanwhile Yemen's human rights minister, Izzedine Al-Ashabi, says thousands have been killed by fighters opposing the government of President Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi.
"There are more than a thousand people who have been martyred at the hands of armed militias and units of the armed forces that have rebelled against the legitimate (government). The killings were concentrated across the Yemeni provinces, with Aden as the biggest disaster, as well as Dhalea and Taiz."
The fighting has made life increasingly perilous for the country's 25 million people, who rely heavily on imported food.
Aid agencies say both sides are holding up deliveries of vital aid.
Houthis are stopping convoys of trucks reaching the southern port city of Aden, while an arms blockade by Saudi-led coalition navies searching ships for weapons, are holding up food deliveries by sea.
Mr Ashabi says aid is urgently needed across the country, with Aden now in crisis.
"The United Nations and international statistics say that there are 12 million Yemenis who are in urgent need for humanitarian intervention. This is roughly half the population."
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