A CEASEFIRE in Yemen is set to begin on Monday at midnight, on the eve of UN-brokered peace talks in Switzerland, a government delegate at the negotiations said.

Mueen Abdulmalek, a member of the government delegation, said “we hope the militias will commit to the ceasefire this time,” referring to Iran-backed rebel forces in Yemen.

A presidency source confirmed the truce would begin at midnight local time based on an agreement between President Abedrabbo Mansour Hadi and Yemen’s UN envoy Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed.

However, it remains unclear if Huthi rebels and allied forces -- renegade troops still loyal to former strongman Ali Abdullah Saleh -- would commit to the halt in fighting.

Yemen’s warring parties are meetingin Switzerland this week in a bid to end the civil war that has so far claimed the lives of 6000 people including an incredible three children a day.

The United Nations-sponsored peace talks aim to end nine months of hostilities between local forces in the civil war, being backed by others including Iran on the one side and Saudi Arabia on the other.

While the world’s attention has been squarely focused on Syria and Iraq and the expansion of ISIS, the ravaging of Yemen is being seen by Western analysts as leaving the nation vulnerable to takeover by a third power like ISIS unless peace can be restored.

Already ISIS and al-Qaeda forces have been noted by US intelligence and the White House as taking advantage of the chaos and setting up camps within Yemen.

The Saudi led coalition yesterday captured an archipelago of islands in the Red Sea that the Iran-backed Shiite Houthi forces had been using for storing and smuggling weapons into the country.

Public “fatigue” of Middle East humanitarian and refugee crisis has long frustrated charity groups working in the area.

Yesterday, Save The Children released a report specifically on the mortality rate of children caught up in the indiscriminate bombing of civilian homes by both warring sides.

It found more than 1500 children had died or seriously injured since March, many from unexploded ordinance or from disease with basic medical care no longer available. The country also has he greatest need of humanitarian assistance with 21 million people deemed at risk.

“The international community’s reluctance to publicly condemn the human cost of conflict in Yemen gives the impression that diplomatic relations and arms sales trump the lives of Yemen’s children,” Save The Children’s country director Edward Santiago said.

“The world must not stand by while children are being bombed, it must demand that civilian lives and civilian facilities like hospitals are protected.”

He welcomed the peace talks and a commitment by Saudi Arabian forces to honour a ceasefire.