U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon announced that the United Nations will host peace talks on the conflict in Yemen in Geneva starting May 28. Unlike previous proposals to hold talks in Riyadh, diplomats will meet in a neutral city. The goal of the talks will be to “restore momentum towards a Yemeni-led political transition process,” Ban said, and he urged parties to the conflict to participate “in good faith and without preconditions.” That has already been complicated by the reactions of both exiled Yemeni President Abdu Rabbu Mansour Hadi’s government and the leadership of the Houthi movement. Hadi’s Foreign Minister Riad Yassin complained about the short notice and the country’s U.N. ambassador said the president might not attend in person. In a speech yesterday, Abdel-Malek al-Houthi said he wouldn’t participate unless the parties agree to abide by a power sharing agreement set up last September.

Off the Yemeni coast, Iran defused tensions over a ship of humanitarian aid yesterday when Deputy Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian announced it would allow the ship to be inspected by the United Nations in Djibouti before continuing on to Hodeida. The cargo ship was at times escorted by two Iranian warships and there were concerns it would try to break the Saudi blockade of Yemen’s coast.

http://foreignpolicy.com/2015/05/21/u-n-announces-yemen-peace-talks-as-ship-crisis-averted/

SANAA, Yemen — As the Saudi-led bombing campaign in Yemen resumed earlier this week, after a brief ceasefire, hospitals across the capital were getting ready to treat an influx of the wounded despite dwindling supplies of medicine and fuel. Doctors were going over detailed lists of needed medications, recruiting volunteer staff, and making black-market deals for overpriced diesel and fuel to keep generators and ambulances running. Some staff were taking up residence in the hospital to avoid the time and cost of travel to and fro.

But despite their best efforts, the needs of the war wounded far outweigh the services these medical workers can provide. Sanaa’s publicly-run Kuwait Hospital was one of several hospitals where staff said they had to send patients away, because essential equipment had become inoperable without electricity or fuel for generators.

I visited the hospital during a power outage. During the visit, an injured woman told me she had lost her adult son in an explosion in the Mount Nogum neighborhood of Sanaa on May 11. Shrapnel severed his head “like a sword,” she said. The blast had been triggered by an airstrike on a weapons storage facility in the neighborhood.

http://foreignpolicy.com/2015/05/21/saudi-arabias-cruel-stranglehold-yemen-human-rights/

TEHRAN: Iran voiced support Thursday for efforts to relaunch political talks on the Yemen crisis but said it opposed foreign interference in the conflict in which it backs the Houthi rebels.

Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif also called for a cease-fire in Yemen, where Saudi-led coalition warplanes have stepped up raids on the Shiite rebels who have overrun much of the country.

"Iran backs initiatives aimed at bringing Yemeni political groups around the negotiating table," Zarif said as he received the United Nations special envoy to Yemen, Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed.

However, Zarif insisted that the talks should be attended only by Yemen's political groups and that no representatives from "any other country should be present at the dialogue," Fars news agency reported.

http://www.dailystar.com.lb/News/Middle-East/2015/May-21/298832-iran-backs-yemen-talks-but-no-foreign-interference-fm.ashx

CAIRO—

Saudi shells hit an international humanitarian aid office in northern Yemen on Thursday, killing five Ethiopian refugees and wounding 10, a local official said.

Artillery fire and airstrikes hit the town of Maydee along Yemen's border with Saudi Arabia in Hajja province, a stronghold of the Iran-allied Houthi militia that a Saudi-led Arab alliance has been bombing for eight weeks.

Saudi forces and Houthi militiamen exchanged heavy artillery and rocket fire, and Arab airstrikes hit Houthi positions inside Yemen on Thursday, violence that may complicate plans for U.N.-backed peace talks set for May 28 in Geneva.

U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon on Wednesday announced the Geneva talks between the warring Yemeni parties, and both Hadi's government and the Houthis have indicated they will attend.

http://www.voanews.com/content/saudi-arabia-airstrike-hits-humanitarian-aid-office-five-killed/2780877.html