Shelling in Yemen reported on first day of five-day humanitarian truce

TAIZ, Yemen, July 26 (UPI) -- Shelling has been reported in the Yemeni city of Taiz on the first day of a cease-fire designed to allow shipment of humanitarian aid into the country.

Following a written request by deposed President Abd Rabbu Mansour Hadi, the Saudi-led coalition conducting airstrikes against Houthi rebels announced on Saturday it would halt operations in the country for five days.

A Houthi spokesmen told the BBC the rebels would not take a position in the truce until formally notified.

The cease-fire began midnight on Sunday, and while central Yemen and the capital, Sanaa, were reportedly quiet, the shelling in Taiz was joined by reports of clashes between advancing Hadi loyalists and the Houthis in areas north of Aden, which fell to pro-government forces earlier this month.

On July 21, pro-Hadi forces assaulted the Houthis' final stronghold in the city, the same day a World Food Programme ship was able to dock at Aden's Al-Buraiqa port with 3,000 tons of food.

Fighting in Aden and other locations earlier in the month abruptly halted a previous cease-fire organized by the United Nations for the purpose of allowing humanitarian aid to flow into the country.

More than 80 percent of Yemen's population of 25 million are in need of some form of aid, the BBC reports.

The U.N. estimates 13 million people in Yemen are unable to meet their food needs. More than 3,200 have died in the last three months of airstrikes and ground fighting, and over a million have fled their homes. The dead include more than 1,600 civilians, with most perishing in airstrikes.

The conflict began late last year after northern Shia rebels known as Houthis began clashing with the Sunni government of Hadi, taking much of the country, including Sanaa, by March. Hadi fled to Saudi Arabia, which in turn led a coalition of Gulf Arab allies in an air campaign against the rebels.

The Houthis have in the past acknowledged receiving economic aid from Iran, the region's Shia rival to the Sunni kingdom of Saudi Arabia, but Tehran has denied accusations of supplying the rebels with weapons.