Saudi Arabia’s Deputy Defense Minister Prince Khalid bin Salman said on Friday that the Kingdom will continue its political and military support to the Yemeni government in the face of the Iranian-backed Houthi group. A day back, US President Joe Biden made a decision to end US support for the kingdom’s military campaign in Yemen. According to Saudi Deputy Defense Minister, KSA looks forward to continue working with its American partners to improve the humanitarian situation and find a solution to the Yemen crisis.
He further said that the Kingdom’s commitment to support diplomatic efforts to reach a comprehensive settlement in Yemen based on the Gulf initiative, the UN Security Council resolution 2216 and the outcomes of the Yemeni national dialogue. US President Joe Biden announced that his country is ending support to war in Yemen including relevant arm sales. However, President Trump has designated the Houthis group as Specially designated Terrorists Group (SDTG) on 14 January this year.
The Yemeni crisis was started date back in March 2015, when the deposed Yemeni President Abd-Rabbuh Mansur Hadi requested military support from Saudi Arabia after his ousted by Houthi Militia. The nine countries alliance of Arab League led by Saudi Arabia started “Operation Decisive Strom” by launching an offensive against Houthi militia through bombing their positions, Naval blacked and deployment of ground forces into the Yemeni territory. The Saudi Coalition was consist of Egypt, Jordan, Morocco, Sudan, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Kuwait, and Bahrain, while United States provided logistics support, aerial refueling, Intelligence sharing, search and rescue operation in case of aircraft crash or shoot down by the enemy. Beside it, US also agreed for sale of weapons to the coalition partners on priority basis. The three African countries Djibouti, Eritrea, and Somalia offered their airspace, territorial waters, and military bases available to the coalition in their operations against Houthi Militia.
According to UN statistics on Yemeni war crisis, about 233, 000 people lost their lives in the war. Due to ground operations and aerial strikes, about 2,500,000 Yemeni people had been internally displaced, while about 1,000,000 fled out of Yemen for Saudi Arabia, Oman, Sudan and other countries. As per reports, about 20 million people faced hunger problem due to non-availability of food and drinking water in most of the area. The diseases broke out and the war caused a humanitarian crisis.
Later, a UAE backed group Southern Transition Council (STC) emerged in 2017 and got control of the several provinces of Southern Yemen. Saudi government and other coalition partners provided relief goods and humanitarian assistance to Yemeni people but due to ongoing war it was hardly reached to the people in war affected areas particularly in Northern Yemen under Houthis control. There was out cry by International Human Rights Watch dogs and humanitarian groups against Saudi Led Coalition for using banned weaponry and targeting civilians. Saudi government took initiative to conclude an agreement between the Yemeni government and Southern Transition Council (STC) to minimize the magnitude of the problem. Both parties signed an agreement in Riyadh on 05 Nov 2019. The implementation of agreement was stalled by some differences between the parties, which has been resolved in the recent past and things will likely proceed in the direction securing peace in Southern Yemen in coming days.
The recent announced by the new US administration is a part of its overall Middle East strategy. By pulling back its support to Yemen war and halting the arms sales to Arab states are well thought steps to give positive signal to Iran before renegotiating Iranian Nuclear Deal. By easing Iran in Yemen and stalling arms to GCC Countries will help facilitate the United States to revolve the new deal with Iran. Whereas billions of dollars arms sales can be materialized by exploring provisions available in the US law at a later stage. It is advisable that Saudi Arabia and the Yemeni groups must seize this opportunity and implement the Riyadh agreement to end the miseries of the Yemeni people. Saudi Government should work to help the Yemeni government, STC and Houthis to constitute a similar trilateral deal to end the war in the Yemen. As per experts, the recent designation of Houthis by the United States will help to bring the Houthis on negotiating table. War is not a solution of any problem but mother of all problems.
