Cairo stands against turning Yemen into a center for promoting non-Arab states' influence in the region and for threatening the neighboring Arab states' security, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah Sisi said on Monday.
CAIRO (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 13th August, 2018) Cairo stands against turning Yemen into a center for promoting non-Arab states' influence in the region and for threatening the neighboring Arab states' security, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah Sisi said on Monday.
"We are adamantly opposed to turning Yemen into a center of non-Arab forces' influence, or into a center for threatening the fraternal Arab states' security and stability, or [for threatening] the freedom of navigation in the Red Sea and the Bab-el-Mandeb strait," Sisi told reporters following his meeting with his Yemeni counterpart Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi.
According to Sisi, Yemen's security and stability is vitally important not only for Egypt's national security, but for the whole region.
Yemeni government has been fighting Houthi rebels since August 2014. In March 2015, the crisis deepened, as the Saudi-led coalition of Arab states entered into conflict and started striking the rebels at the local government's request. Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates supported the operation dubbed Decisive Storm. Egypt, Jordan, Morocco, Pakistan and Sudan followed later.
Tens of thousands of people have been killed in the course of the Yemeni conflict, including 6,500 civilians, according to UN figures.
