by the Saudi-led coalition against Yemeni people should be held accountable for the war crimes perpetrated in Yemen over the past year and a half,” Zarif was quoted as saying by Iranian state-funded Press TV on Monday in a letter to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon.

Mourners take part in the funeral of Abdul Qader Helal, the mayor of Sanaa, the capital of Yemen, who was killed by an apparent Saudi-led air strike that ripped through a wake attended by some of the country's top political and security officials in Sanaa, October 10, 2016. REUTERS/Khaled Abdullah

Zarif also called on Ban to facilitate Iran sending a plane carrying humanitarian aides to Sanaa.

Saudi Arabia and its Gulf Arab allies have launched thousands of air strikes against the Houthis and have imposeda naval blockade that has restricted access to imports for a country that depends on buying food abroad to feed itself.

This month the Houthis launched a missile at a ship from the United Arab Emirates and at government positions on a island at the strategic 20 km (12 mile)-wide Bab al-Mandab strait, which controls the mouth of the Red Sea, on the main shipping route from the Indian Ocean to Europe through the Suez Canal.

Among the dead in the funeral bombing on Saturday were notables straddling the country’s many political divides, threatening to harden the will of powerful armed tribes around the capital who may make common cause with the Houthis.

“Despite all the massacres that have happened in this war, attacking a funeral is unprecedented and crosses a