The Coalition Command to Restore Legitimacy in Yemen announced in a statement on Monday that it has exchanged nine Saudi detainees for 109 Yemeni nationals ahead of a planned truce and peace talks. "Nine Saudi detainees have been recovered and 109 Yemenis who were arrested in the military operations zone" near the border have been handed over, the coalition said in the statement. Saudi Arabia received its nationals on Sunday, the coalition statement carried by the Saudi Press Agency said. The alliance "hopes to begin a truce in conflict areas of the Republic of Yemen," it added. The agreement is one of several prisoner swaps between the two sides since late last year. Last week the United Nations said the warring parties had agreed to a cessation of hostilities starting at midnight on April 10 and peace talks in Kuwait on April 18 as part of a fresh push to end the crisis following two rounds of failed talks last year. More than 90 people have been killed on the Saudi side of the frontier by shelling and in skirmishes over the past year. But since the tribal mediation, the border zone has been relatively calm, the coalition has said, and the latest prisoner exchange occurred in this context. The coalition said on Monday that it was satisfied with the lull along the frontier. It said it hoped "to see it spread to zones of combat, in a way to facilitate the sending of humanitarian aid to all Yemen's territory" and support UN efforts to reach a political settlement. Food and medical supplies have already been sent to the Houthi rebel stronghold of Saada, coalition spokesman Brig. Gen. Ahmed Al-Assiri said. The Saudi Civil Defense agency said on Sunday that eight people, including four children, had been wounded by fire from Yemen. — Agencies The cross-border fire hit the Samata and Tiwal districts, Civil Defense said. Meanwhile, air raids killed 14 men suspected of belonging to Al-Qaeda in southern Yemen on Sunday.
