Saudi-led coalition bombs Houthis in north Yemen, offers five-day truce

By Mohammed Ghobari and Mohammed Mukhashaf

CAIRO/ADEN (Reuters) - Saudi-led warplanes bombed targets in Yemen's Saada province, a bastion of Iranian-allied Houthi rebels, on Friday and Riyadh then announced a five-day humanitarian ceasefire to begin on May 12, conditioned on Houthis agreeing to the pause.

Hours before, Saudi authorities warned all civilians to leave the northwestern Saada region, which borders on Saudi Arabia, by sunset on Friday after threatening a harsh response to Houthi shelling of Saudi frontier towns earlier this week.

Saudi state television channel Al Ekhbariya said the whole of the arid, mountainous province would become a military target from Friday evening, hinting at an escalation in the Saudi-led coalition's six-week-old intervention in Yemen's civil war.

It aims to reverse the Shi'ite Muslim Houthi militia's cross-country advances -- seen by Saudi Arabia, the world's top oil exporter and arch-regional rival of Iran, as a security threat -- and restore President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi in power.

Later on Friday, Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir proclaimed a five-day humanitarian truce to start on Tuesday at 11 p.m. Yemen time, and "subject to renewal if it works out" -- if Houthi forces agree to the pause.

"We hope the Houthis will come to their senses and realize the interests of Yemen and the Yemeni people should be the top priority for everyone," Jubeir told a news conference with U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry in Paris.

"The requirements are first and foremost that there is a commitment by the Houthis and their allies ... to abide by this ceasefire," he added. "This ceasefire will (apply) throughout Yemen, or nowhere in Yemen."

International concern about the humanitarian situation has grown as the air strikes have killed more than 1,300 people, sent others fleeing from their homes and wrecked infrastructure, causing shortages of food, medicine and fuel.