Saudi Arabia released seven prisoners it was holding from Yemen's Houthi movement, who were flown to the Houthi-controlled capital Sanaa on Wednesday by the Red Cross, the day after a Saudi prisoner freed by the Houthis arrived in Riyadh.
The apparent swap comes as Yemen's warring parties are still hammering out details of a larger prisoner exchange that they agreed last month as a confidence-building gesture at the first major peace talks of the nearly four-year-old war.
console.log("catid body is "+catID);if(catID==120){document.getElementsByClassName("divConnatix")[0].style.display ="none";var script = document.createElement('script'); script.src = 'https://player.anyclip.com/anyclip-widget/lre-widget/prod/v1/src/lre.js'; script.setAttribute('pubname','jpostcom'); script.setAttribute('widgetname','0011r00001lcD1i_12258'); document.getElementsByClassName('divAnyClip')[0].appendChild(script);}else if(catID!=69 && catID!=2){ document.getElementsByClassName("divConnatix")[0].style.display ="none"; var script = document.createElement('script'); script.src = 'https://static.vidazoo.com/basev/vwpt.js'; script.setAttribute('data-widget-id','60fd6becf6393400049e6535'); document.getElementsByClassName('divVidazoo')[0].appendChild(script); }The U.N. special envoy to Yemen, Martin Griffiths, welcomed the release and said he hoped it would encourage the rapid implementation of the larger prisoner swap.