UN expected to approve larger Yemen operation

The UN Security Council is expected on Wednesday to approve an expanded ceasefire monitoring mission in Hodeidah, to try and ensure Yemen's warring parties stick to a plan agreed on last month to de-escalate the country's war.

A draft of the new resolution will be put before the council for a vote, asking that 75 UN observers — up from about the present 20 — be deployed in Hodeidah, the Red Sea port which is the point of entry for most of Yemen's commercial goods and aid supplies, for six months. The monitoring team was initially given a 30-day mandate in December.

Yemen government forces and Iran-backed Houthi rebels agreed to the ceasefire – which does not apply in other regions – during peace talks in Sweden last month, but it has not been fully implemented. A 21-day deadline for doing so passed last week.

The British-drafted resolution will ask UN secretary general Antonio Guterres to “expeditiously” deploy his recommended larger operation, which will be known as the United Nations Mission to support the Hodeidah Agreement (UNMHA).