Yemeni Delegation In Geneva Urges World Community To Put Pressure On Houthis

GENEVA (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 08th September, 2018) The Yemeni delegation calls on the international community to put pressure on the Houthi insurgents from the Ansar Allah movement to make them join the peace talks in Geneva, a member of the Yemeni government delegation at Geneva talks Rana Ghanem told Sputnik.

Consultations between the parties to the Yemeni armed conflict with the UN support in Geneva were supposed to start on Thursday. However, the Houthi delegation said on Wednesday they could not leave the city of Sanaa as they did not have the safe passage guarantee from the Saudi-led coalition, controlling the Yemeni airspace. However, according to coalition spokesman Turki Maliki, the Houthi delegation had been authorized to depart for the talks.

"We call on the international community to put pressure on this movement to begin the peace process in order to save Yemen from greater destruction and suffering," Ghanem said.

The absence of the Houthi delegation at the talks did not however prevent UN Special Envoy for Yemen Martin Griffiths from starting informal consultations with representatives of the Yemeni government, with whom he held a meeting on Wednesday evening, after which his office announced the resumption of the negotiation process with the participation of the two parties on Friday.

However, the issue of the Houthis' arrival to Geneva has not yet been resolved. Without their participation, the inter-Yemeni consultations cannot formally start, but even if the Houthi delegation is allowed to depart from Sanaa, the United Nations will be unable to guarantee their safe return to Yemen after the talks are over.

On Thursday, Daifallah Shami, a member of the Houthis' politburo, told Sputnik that the Houthi delegation is prepared to participate in the UN-led consultations with the Yemeni government officials but asks the organization to ensure security during its members' trip and arrival to Geneva.

In April 2016, the government of Yemen and its Houthi opponents held a round of peace talks brokered by the United Nations in Kuwait, which lasted for several months but has not yielded any significant results.

Yemen is engulfed in an armed conflict between the government headed by Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi and the Houthi movement. The Saudi-led coalition of mostly Persian Gulf nations has been carrying out airstrikes against the Houthis at Hadi's request since March 2015. Multiple human rights organizations have criticized the coalition for indiscriminate bombings which result in civilian casualties.