The Yemen peace consultations have reached a good pace and it would be a shame to postpone them in case of failure to kick-start talks between the government and the Houthis, Vladimir Dedushkin, the Russian ambassador to Yemen, said at a press briefing on Friday.
GENEVA (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 07th September, 2018) The Yemen peace consultations have reached a good pace and it would be a shame to postpone them in case of failure to kick-start talks between the government and the Houthis, Vladimir Dedushkin, the Russian ambassador to Yemen, said at a press briefing on Friday.
Consultations on Yemen were supposed to start on Thursday, but the Houthi delegation has failed to arrive in Geneva so far as it was not confident of using Saudi airspace to get to Europe. Earlier in the day, the United Nations said that UN Special Envoy for Yemen Martin Griffiths was working to ensure that the Houthi delegation arrives in Geneva. The delegation has said that it would make a final decision on Friday.
"If talks fall through, then the UN special envoy and all foreign backers of the peace process, the group of 19, the permanent five members, will have to make an effort to renew these talks perhaps within a month, if not in September then in October and again start from where we got to now. This will be a great shame because we have reached a good pace and good results that need to be implemented," Dedushkin said.
Dedushkin added that the current rate of success for the consultations to continue was 50/50. He also stated that the opening of the Sanaa airport would be a major successful step if it were reached at the ongoing Geneva consultations.
"The issue of opening the airport, in my view, is one of the key issues and if we can resolve it here in Geneva, then I think this will be a major step forward," the ambassador said, adding that all ambassadors from the five member states of the UN Security Council had a unified position on Yemen.
"There is no disagreement on Yemen in the Security Council. Some say that we fail at reaching a settlement because of disagreements between Russia and the United States, but there is nothing to be reached. We have complete mutual understanding and unified position," Dedushkin said.
On Wednesday, the Houthi movement said that their delegation did not have permission from the Saudi-led coalition, which controls Yemeni air space, to leave the city of Sanaa. However, according to coalition spokesman Turki Maliki, the Houthi delegation had been authorized to depart for the talks.
