Muscat: Yemen’s Al Houthis and representatives of the anti-Al Houthi coalition is close to reaching an agreement to end the war in Yemen and return authority to the exiled government, media reports have suggested.

According to media reports citing a leaked draft agreement between the two, an Al Houthi delegation has come to an agreement in Muscat with representatives of the Saudi-led coalition with Omani mediation.

The agreement includes ending the war in Yemen, reinstatement of the exiled government’s authority, starting a political dialogue that does not exclude anyone, as well as revisiting the topic of splitting the country into two regions instead of six in a federal system, as reported in the Omani press and other regional papers.

A diplomatic source involved in the negotiations confirmed to Gulf News the presence of representatives from the anti-Al Houthi coalition in Muscat.

The agreement also includes the reorganisation of the army, and the exclusion of former president Ali Abdullah Saleh from any political role, and comes following Omani efforts to reach a solution to the crisis in Yemen.

The Al Houthi Ansar Allah group’s spokesman, Mohammad Abdul Salam, was cited in Oman’s Al Shabiba as saying that views about ending the crisis were exchanged with a number of international and regional parties in Oman.

Those proposals include Al Houthis’ acceptance of UN Security Council resolutions that stipulates Al Houthi withdrawal from cities they have taken, returning of arms they had seized, and a return of full political power to the exiled government.

It will also include a general amnesty for Al Houthis by a decision issued by President Abd Rabbo Mansour Hadi.

The proposal also will ask the former president, Ali Abdullah Saleh, to leave Yemen for another country.

Al Houthi group will also have to confine its activities in Yemen to the political level.

Under the alleged agreement, senior military officers involved in the war would have to retire before the building of a national army which would include all segments of Yemen’s population.

The draft agreement calls for Yemen reconstruction with Gulf and international support after elections

A delegation of the Al Houthi Ansar Allah group, led by head of the Al Houthi political council, Saleh Al Samad, arrived in Oman last Saturday.

Yemen has been pounded by the air strikes since March 25 by a Saudi-led coalition in response to appeals by exiled president Hadi after the Al Houthi militia took most of the country.

Meanwhile, Saudi-led coalition warplanes pounded rebel positions across Sana’a overnight, only hours after the UN envoy to Yemen arrived in the capital to discuss stalled Geneva peace talks, residents said on Saturday.

Among the latest targets to be struck was a house of ousted president Saleh in his hometown of Sanhan, south of the capital.

The raids came after Saleh said in an interview broadcast late on Friday that he had rejected a Saudi offer of “millions of dollars” to oppose the Al Houthi rebels.

Saleh was forced to resign in early 2012 after waging a bloody crackdown on a year of protests calling for an end to his three decades of iron-fisted rule.

His forces have been backing the Al Houthi rebels who seized Sana’a in September before fanning out across other parts of the country this year.

The interview was aired on the Beirut-based Al Mayadeen television channel whose presenter said he spoke from Sana’a.

But the former strongman no longer resides in his Sanhan house which has been targeted occasionally since the Saudi-led coalition launched its strikes.

The latest raids hit the rebel-held air force headquarters in Sana’a, arms depots in Sanhan and Dailami airbase, also in the capital, witnesses said.

They also targeted rebels in the oil-rich eastern province of Marib and the western region of Hodeidah.

The raids came only hours after UN special envoy Esmail Ould Shaikh Ahmad flew in to the Yemeni capital for talks with political parties.

“All Yemeni parties must return to dialogue,” he said upon his arrival on Friday, quoted by sabanews.net.

A Geneva conference which had been due to take place on Thursday was postponed, in a fresh blow to UN efforts to end a conflict estimated to have killed almost 2,000 people.

— With inputs from AFP