Hawzah News Agency - Saudi Arabia has been holding talks with Yemen’s popular Houthi movement for the first time in more than two years in a sign that the kingdom is willing to end hostilities, The Financial Times reports. 

The "back-channel" negotiations began after the Houthis announced they would stop launching retaliatory drone and missile attacks against positions inside Saudi Arabia if Riyadh stopped its aggression, the paper said Saturday.

“There has been a lot of progress in the talks,” a Dubai-based political commentator was quoted as saying.

“We are now in the last five minutes of the Yemen war,” Abdulkhaleq Abdulla told the British newspaper.

The paper, citing a Western diplomat, said the drone attacks on the Saudi oil facilities were key to the shift in Riyadh’s position.

"Another factor behind Riyadh’s shift has been the weakening of its coalition after the United Arab Emirates," it added.