Peter Salisbury
Good morning, everyone, if you can just give us one moment, we’re trying to sort out a small issue and we’ll return.
Abdirahman Ali
Alright, thank you.
Peter Salisbury
Alright. Good morning everybody and welcome to this Chatham House webinar War and Pandemic: Is Peace Possible in Yemen?” Just a few housekeeping notes before we begin. This event will be on the record and it will be recorded. You can tweet about it under the hashtag #CHEvents and any questions you might have for any of the participants, you can enter into the Q&A box, which you should see somewhere on the bottom of your screen, at the right-hand sign – at the right-hand side, even. I haven’t had enough coffee yet, and we will do our best to get as many of those questions answered. We’ll finish as promptly as we possibly can. We’re starting about four or five minutes late, so we’ll try and run to about four or five minutes after 2:00pm UK time.
Okay, so, it is five years this March since Saudi Arabia intervened into the early stages of Yemen’s Civil War. The Saudis predicted a quick win, but five years later, there really is no end in sight. In 2017, complicating matters forward – further, the Houthis, who took over the North West of the country in 2014 and 2015, killed their ally, Ali Abdullah Saleh, and since then, have become an increasingly dominant presence in that part of the country. And they’re lined up against a range of armed groups, some of them backed by the Saudis, some of them backed by the United Arab Emirates.
About 100,000 people have died as a direct consequence of the war, many more as an indirect consequence, and even COVID-19 outbreak, at the beginning of this year, was not enough to convince the various parties to the conflict to find a way to initiate even a UN-led ceasefire level and move towards a political process in the country. The UN has already said that this is the world’s biggest humanitarian crisis and the question for our group today, for our panellists today, is what next? Is peace possible and if so, how?
To walk us through the situation on the ground in Yemen and to help us understand better what the barriers are to peace and what might be alternatives to the current framework, we have Abdirahman Ali. He is the Country Director for Relief International. He’s been based in Yemen since 2016, first with CARE International and now, since December, as the Director, the Country Director of Relief International. We have Jamila Ali Raja, who is the Founder and Manager of Consult Yemen. Jamila has more than 30 years of experience with government, non-governmental and international organisations and she works on issues related to international and local politics, with a special emphasis on Yemen. And she founded Consult-Yemen in 2009 as a private consultancy providing media application and negotiation services to political and social groups. Last, but certainly not least, is Rasha Jarhum. She is the Founder and Director of the Peace Track Initiative. She is a South Yemeni and she has founded – pardon me, she is a South Yemini. The Peace Track Initiative is host to the Human Rights Research and Education Centre at Ottawa University and through the Peace Track, Rasha has been supporting the inclusion of women in Yemen’s peace process, including by sending women’s independent delegations to UN and Saudi-led peace talks.
So, I’m going to keep my comments to an absolute minimum. We’re going to start off with Abdi, he’s going to talk to us about the direct impact of the war, why it’s so important to end it. We’ll then move onto Jamila, to ask her why, after five years of war, there is no peace? And then, we will move to Rasha and we’ll ask her whether or not peace is possible? So, Abdi, starting with you, maybe you can give us a bit of context, a bit of insight into what life is like on the ground, why it’s so important to halt this conflict and move towards building a meaningful peace?
Abdirahman Ali
Thank you very much, Peter, and first, let me begin by thanking you and the Chatham House for giving Relief International this opportunity to share our thoughts on this subject.
Yemen is currently facing one of the most difficult crises that we find around the world. As many of us know, the conflict is now going into six years and all we can report is untold suffering to the Yemeni population. This time, I will say the conflict is reaching a critical stage. Why? Because the global pandemic, COVID-19, it’s taking a toll on many Yemeni families. We have been dealing with a crisis, manmade crisis, that have led to loss of life, destruction of property, both civilian and public institutions, and, also, large scale displacement of populations. This situation, unfortunately, continues in Yemen to date and with COVID-19, we are experiencing a situation where families cannot even meet the very basic – and some – most of them do not even know when they will get their sec – their next meal. This is quite unfortunate.
The most troubling thing, again, is that the war and the conflict is not showing signs of ending. We see more and more suffering every day, in many parts of the country, across Yemen. Displacement is taking place also from other quarters. Currently, the country is facing huge flooding in many governorates. This flooding is contributing to the already serious situation, where families are moving from one location to the other, due to the conflict. This year alone, over 2,000 people have been reported to have been displaced or injured or homes – their homes damaged and 60% of these people are women and children. This is quite troubling.
And the other bigger issue that we are currently facing in Yemen is the increasing cost of food for families. The cost of living is skyrocketing every month. Basic food commodities are becoming too expensive for majority of the Yemeni population. As we know, 80% of the Yemeni population at the moment need some form of humanitarian assistance. Every – in last year, we have been providing, as humanitarian organisations, including Relief International, an average of 13 million Yemenis have been receiving assistance on a monthly basis. This year, the number has dropped to about 9.5 million. This is a huge drop. But the other troubling thing is that funding and assistance to the Yemeni population from donors and humanitarian community is continuing to decline. So, we are facing a situation where the conflict is continuing, the crisis is growing by the day, more and more problems are facing the Yemeni population and the funding is going down.
This is the time when we are asking our humanitarian donors and the international community to stand with Yemen. I know that there has been steps that have been made to bring this conflict to a stop. Efforts have been made by the international community to bring this conflict and to have the parties to the conflict negotiate. At Relief International, we continue to support this initiative and we urge parties to be frank and honest in their engagement in order to bring this conflict to an end. It is not necessary to have this conflict. It is only causing more chaos, more suffering, to the Yemeni population. It’s not serving anyone’s interest. This is the message you like to pass to the international community, to the people of Yemen and to the authorities and parties who are involved in this conflict.
To the donors, as Relief International, we are asking and requesting their continued support. We know we are dealing with a conflict and we are working in a situation where it’s quite difficult to access those folk who need their assistance most. But at the same time, we know the work we are doing, as Relief International, as aid organisations in general in Yemen, is having an impact on the lives of people. We are facing challenges, that is true. We can’t deny that there are no challenges. There are issues in accessing people across the country, but again, we know that there is a hope to remove this blockade, there’s a hope to resolve this issue. It’s not a time to cut aid for Yemen. It’s not a time to suspend aid. It’s not the time to even to reduce aid for Yemen. It’s the time we need to, all of us, stand with the Yemeni population. This is not the time to put Yemen in the backseat. It’s a time for Yemen to be put in the front seat, so that everyone can see that there is change that is taking place, in terms of the work we are doing, but also, their obstacles and their needs are growing by the day.
In Relief International, we are currently providing health, nutrition, water and sanitation and food assistance to the population that we serve. We are reaching on every month about 70,000 people with integrated health and nutrition, water and sanitation and protection services, and approximately 100,000 on monthly basis with food assistance. This is not to say that we are covering the needs. The needs are huge and be – we know there are populations who have not been reached. We know there are people who are suffering. But we also know that the resources we have can only do just so much. This is why we are asking the international community to continue engaging us and the entire humanitarian community to provide lifesaving assistance to the Yemeni population.
This year, the humanitarian response plan was not funded well. The pledged in confidence in riyal did not provide positive results, as expected, given the context in Yemen. Currently, well, we know that out of the US $1.3 billion that was pledged, we have about US $900 million received to date and the overall pledge was 3.2 billion. So, this is the first year in my experience in Yemen I see that the humanitarian response plan has been poorly funded, despite the increasing challenges and the crisis has been continuing in Yemen. We need this to be reversed. We need the international community and the donors to look at Yemen and provide hope to the people who are suffering in these difficult circumstances.
This conflict is manmade and can only be resolved through peaceful negotiation and be engaging all parties who are involved, including the actors in this conflict, the international community, the youth and the civil society who are present in Yemen. This is crucial, because everyone in Yemen counts. There’s no-one who can be told – even the marginalist groups who have not been brought onboard need to be considered. This conflict requires a homegrown solution. It does not require an external solution. External facilitators can help in supporting the Yemeni people to achieve this end result and we urge all those parties who are involved in this conflict to be frank, as I said before, and to look at the lives of the Yemeni people and put their lives before any other opport – any other thinking or any other interest.
The other thing I wish to say is that at the moment the situation is just getting more complex and we are providing services, but we also need more space, in order for us to reach, with the little resources we have, more people. And I must say that this year, there has been a lot of joint advocacy by the humanitarian actors in Yemen and through this joint advocacy, we were able to receive significant improvement in the operative environment. We can now assess, say that there has been big improvement compared to the last few years. We need to keep this momentum, where there is positive development, in terms of how authorities allow us to access people who are most in need, we need to appreciate and keep the momentum going. Advocacy, working together and putting everybody together is the best way we can have access to Yemen and improve while others are – on the other side, we are also concentrating on bringing peace to the instability to Yemen.
As Relief International, we support the work of the international community, the UN Special Envoy in leading this process and we urge all the Yemenis to support this particular process, in order for us to have solution to this crisis. We will continue to stand by Yemen. We will continue to operate within our mandate as Relief International, and we’ll continue to be guided by our humanitarian principles, to ensure that aid is provided in a transparent and accountable manner. We have many instances say this and we’ll continue to do so. And I’m saying this because I know we are working in a complex environment, sorry, and I know that there are concerns that maybe we are not delivering aid properly. I just want to make it clear that as Relief International, we are bound by the humanitarian principles ands we want to continue upholding those principles, and even when we feel they are at risk of being violated, we pause and re-engage. We re-engage with authorities, we ask for more access and we ask – and we explain our position as humanitarian organisation and we’ll continue to fulfil this mandate impartially and independently, in order for us to be accountable to the donors.
We urge the donors for Yemen international community to have this clear, so that we know that we are supporting people who need us at this difficult time. Let’s not forget that Yemen has been considered as the worst humanitarian crisis in the world. This country has undergone conflict displacement, it has undergone the largest cholera outbreak in the region, and in 2017 and 2016. COVID-19 is taking a toll on people. About 2,000 people have been reported to have contracted now, but again, we know that is – that number is just not a proper representation of the picture in Yemen. We know that the people who have been infected are more than this, because the testing capacity is low, the healthcare system is weak, and we know that there’s a lot of misinformation about COVID-19 across the country. We need to pull together, we need to provide resources to the organisations working in Yemen, to the UN, to all the local actors in Yemen, so that we have this concerted effort and help Yemenis overcome this. And most importantly, this is not a time to reduce aid, as I said. It’s a time to stop the war and is a time to increase the support and to stand with Yemen. Thank you very much.
Peter Salisbury
Thank you so much, Abdi. Just a couple of quick notes of housekeeping before we move onto Rasha. Unfortunately, we’re having trouble getting Jamila on the call. We’re going to try and fix this as Rasha is speaking, but we may move directly into the Q&A after she has spoken. On that note, again, in the bottom right-hand of your screen there is a Q&A box. Please do put in as many questions as you possibly can, questions, not statements, and we’ll be delighted to come back to you and get your questions out there. So, Rasha, we’ve heard from Abdi. He’s saying, in effect, to address the world’s largest humanitarian crisis, we need to end the war, among other things. Why hasn’t the war ended yet and what can be done to end it?
Rasha Jarhum
Hmmm, thank you, Peter, and thank you, Abdi, for this important intervention. Yes, we are the worst humanitarian crisis in the world, but we have to remind everyone that Yemen, even before the war, we were a poor country in the region. We had a humanitarian crisis even before, because of drought and because of armed conflicts that were happening sporadically, so, this is not new. We’ve always heard humanitarian organisations talk about humanitarian crisis in Yemen, since as far as I started focusing on this in 2009. I don’t feel like the humanitarian organisations were able to support the local humanitarian organisations sometimes in building their capacity to take the lead on this, or even the state is failing, in terms of having institutions that can deal with humanitarian consequences.
As the Peace Track Initiative, we are a feminist organisation that have been positioning ourselves as a track two feminist partner. We work with women groups mainly. We try to support – we work in two main areas, which is inclusion and protection. In terms of inclusion, when we talk about inclusion, it’s not only in the peace process, but it’s also in the humanitarian, political and all aspects of the public life that a woman can lead. And what we do in – we try to work in the three diplomatic tracks in the peace process, so in track one, we try to pressure the delegations to have women within their delegates to the peace process. And in track two, we try to facilitate peace consultations with women groups and the main topics that are being discussed are what the women are seeing as priorities. So, we’ve been leading on consultations about the ceasefire process itself, about the South issue, about the transitional justice and about releasing the detainees, among other issues.
What we heard from the women is that in terms of the ceasefire, we saw a formal process and we also monitored an informal process. There are times when there is de-escalation that is happening through, for example, the last quarter of last year, when there was some kind of informal talks between the Houthis and Saudi Arabia. There was a de-escalation, at least between the cross-fighting between Yemen and between the Houthis and Saudi Arabia. Now, with the aid, as well, we saw some momentarily de-escalation. So, if we talk about peace factors, we do see times when there is a de-escalation that is unannounced and that is informal and then, we see the formal peace pro – I mean, the formal ceasefire process, which was led by the UN. We all heard about the global ceasefire call and, frankly, we were optimistic for one minute and then, we lost that hope, mainly because, as everyone is saying, Yemen is the worst humanitarian crisis. This did not add to the sensitivity of the situation between armed conflict to really prioritise ending the war. So, everyone who was hoping that the pandemic will lead to de-escalation, this hope basically vanished with the continuing pandemic spread and there was no – more of an escalation, rather than a de-escalation. There was only a momentarily unilateral ceasefire by Saudi Arabia that lasted for one month and a half and then the escalations continued.
Now, the Yemen peace process is, what we are seeing is we have a UN-led process and then we have a Saudi and the regional countries’ led process, so Oman and Saudi Arabia, mainly. So, what we saw, in terms of the UN-led process, we have noticed that everything that was being worked at since the assuming of Mr Griffith in 2018, was a focus mainly on humanitarian issues and a focus on, let’s say, confidence building issues, rather than really discussing the controversial issues. So, the issues that he’s been focusing on was releasing the detainees, the salaries, and responding to COVID. It’s becoming more of a humanitarian and the moment that the discussion moves towards these issues, it becomes politicalised and there is stubbornness, in terms of implementation. So, the recommendation in this case is to completely move the humanitarian aspect into a different process that is not linked to the political one. So, opening the airports, salaries issues, releasing the detainees, all of these issues that are more humanitarian needs to have a separate parallel track that is mainly led locally and nationally by the actors themselves, by Yemenis themselves, so it’s a Yemeni-led process. This, I can see that it will have a chance to move forward in implementing these and commenting to these issues.
For the Saudi-led process, there was a process that is a negotiation with the Houthis directly and then there was a process of mediation process between the government and the South Transitional Council, and we’ve seen the Riyadh Agreement was signed last year, in November. We were, actually, very optimistic, because the Riyadh Agreement had more details comparing to Stockholm Agreement, so it had more clarity. It had very optimistic deadlines. It was not implemented as the way it was hoped for. There was a delay, which is – this is what we have noticed that always Yemenis they will sign agreements and they will agree, and this is so easy to sign an agreement, but then, the implementation and committing, that’s where the challenge is. And we always advise that there should be committees for monitoring and committees for implementation of these agreements that are being signed.
Very recently, we saw some progress, in terms of Riyadh Agreement. We’ve seen announcement of removal of military, basically, military camps in Aden, to outside of Aden, the appointment of the new Governor, the appointment of the new Aden Security Officer. So, these were some of the issue – the steps that were supposed to be implemented within the Riyadh Agreement.
Now, as women groups, we try to support all these processes, first through these consultations. For Riyadh Agreement, for example, at least ten articles originated with our recommendations and these included disarmament and – of the cities, mainly Aden, building back the institutions, anti-corruption recommendations, these were all reflected in the agreement. But what we are now focusing on is the monitoring part. We’re working on monitoring the Riyadh implementation and, also, the Stockholm and the UN-led process. We are a bit concerned that there is not enough accountability and there is an appeasement approach or policy when it comes to specifically the Houthis. Everything that we’re committed to is not being implemented, except for one exception, which was the Baha’is’ release. This was a positive step. So, if we look into the factors for peace, in terms of the Houthis and what they are doing, what we have noticed is that, first, they have their own vision, in terms of ending the wars, that they published in April. This showed some form of commitment, but again, there are always concern and trust issues when it comes to the Houthis is that they say something and then they do something else. Since the aid, we’ve seen the escalations increase back in Marib mainly, so we are worried that conflict is re-escalating, basically.
So, just to end my brief and focus it into some recommendations, for us, what we see in order to move forward and really start in implementing or achieving peace, we need an accountable peace process where – and an inclusive peace process. Inclusion, in terms of civil society, youth, women and, also, the other armed groups, which are not included. We have – we – what we are seeing is that the peace process is working in silos. What’s being done at a state level, in terms of Saudi Arabia is separate from what is being done through the UN-led process. At some point there needs to be some kind of co-ordination, like what we have seen at the GCC Initiative and mechanism. It was complementary efforts, rather than what we are seeing right now in work in silos.
The other aspect is the accountability part. In Yemen, what we – in local mediation, there is always a public pressure aspect and a public process for mediation, where they bring people who can guarantee and people who can observe any peace agreement. This is needed in this process. Every time we don’t name who is blocking the peace process, we’re giving them more power and – to, basically, continue not implementing in the peace process. So, we – they – those who are blocking the peace process, they need to be named, they need to be held accountable. When they say they are going to implement something, they need to be held accountable and this is how, basically, they will feel under pressure and they will have a reason to compromise and show some goodwill from their part.
The rest – the last recommendation is that it needs to be a Yemeni-led process. What we have seen, in terms of UN process, there is – I don’t feel that there is enough consultation with the Yemeni people and the peace process. We have seen the joint declaration that came out very recently, and the draft of the joint declaration, which is on the ceasefire and, to me, personally, it was very disappointing. It did not feel that there is a grasp to the context of what is happening. In terms of inclusion, it was even more disappointing, because they proposed inclusion of women at the very end of the process, after even signing a Peace Agreement and limiting it only to the committee’s inclusion of women in the committees that are going to stem out of the Peace Agreement.
I think I’m going to stop here and I’m happy to address any questions, thank you.
Peter Salisbury
Thank you so much, Rasha, and thank you, Abdi, for such excellent presentations. I feel like you’ve brought a lot of clarity to a lot of the challenges that Yemen poses, both in terms of the humanitarian crisis and in terms, of course, of how we get from where we are today to something like a peace process or a political process. I have some unfortunate news, we’re having some problems getting through to Jamila, so she will not be joining us this afternoon. So, we will move directly into the Q&A session. I am going o use the Chair’s prerogative. First, and I’m going to ask a couple of questions of my own, first of Abdi and then of Rasha.
Abdi, you spoke broadly about some of the challenges and some of the rhetoric around humanitarian organisations’ struggles to deliver aid in a manner in-keeping with humanitarian principles. I wondered– and I’m sure that people are very interested to hear about what the challenges have been, because it’s been such a public issue, what have the challenges been there? Why have we heard so much about this problem, and what’s being done to address it, if you can speak to that?
Abdirahman Ali
Thank you, Peter. The biggest challenge, in the context in Yemen, where we are operating, is, of course, the conflict and the risks that it’s posing to frontline staff. This is quite challenging, because as aid organisations, we are operating under our mandates and trying to keep the humanitarian principles at all times. When the conflict is continuing and there’s discussion of public places and strikes are ongoing, then the safety of the teams that we have on ground comes for us; this is one challenge. The other challenge that we are facing now is the health tips and sometimes slow process of approvals by authorities for us to reach people most in need. This, of course, we have to admit is a continuing challenge and we are dealing with it on daily basis.
The other challenge, as aid organisations, and I’ve said this in my initial introduction remarks, is the reduction of resources for Yemen, especially in this 2020. The needs are growing day-by-day and the funds have reduced. Programmes have been suspended, in some parts of Yemen, some problems have been scaled down, and it’s coming at a time when we are struggling with this pandemic. So, these are the three key challenges that we continue to face in Yemen, as aid organisations and what we are doing about this is to increase our advocacy with authorities across Yemen. For instance, on the issue of the conflict and the risk it’s posing to staff, we continue to put measures in place to reduce any impact on the programmes that we are implementing and, also, the people that we are serving. Our safety measures in-country include both the beneficiaries and the people we serve and, also, the frontline workers who are responding to the crisis.
One of the other challenge, also, we faced, as I said, was the Red tips and this, for us, is continued and continued engagement with actors, with authorities in Yemen, to continue to remind them their responsibility under humanitarian – international humanitarian law, to ensure that we have safe and unhindered access to the population that we serve. This we continue to remind, and we continue, also, to maintain our impartiality, our neutrality and independence as humanitarian organisations, to deliver. In Relief International, we are working in fragile countries across the globe. Yemen is one of them and these principles continue to remain our guiding formula for response. We’ll continue to do that.
In terms of the funding gaps, I did mention, in my introductory remarks, as well, we continue to engage our donors to remind them on the progress that is being made, in terms of addressing the Red tips, that donors have previously raised concerns, and ability to start our programmes and ability to reach people safely. We continue to engage, we continue to advocate with authorities, with the donors and continue to remind them of our responsibility, collectively, to address these challenges and not to forget that people in need must be addressed and must be supported, regardless of the context. We are there in Yemen for a purpose and our purpose is to serve those who need most our services. Thank you.
Peter Salisbury
Thank you, Abdi, very much, and Rasha, one of the questions that has come in, that I think will be really helpful to have your address, is someone asks if someone can summarise the objectives of the different parties in these negotiations. And I wondered if we could expand that, then, a little bit, who’s involved in talks right now, what are their objectives? And then, you talked about a more inclusive process, which is something that, sort of, in – with my hat as an Analyst at Crisis Group, I’ve advocated for as well. Could you talk to us a little bit about why other parties might be involved in an internationally mediated process or a local mediated process and how that would play out, then?
Rasha Jarhum
Okay, so, the parties that are involved, whether in – and basically, in the UN-led process it’s mainly the government, international recognised government, and then the Houthis. And their priorities, although, like, that could be seen that they are different, so, for example, the Houthis are prioritising political changes. So, they want to have a new committee, for example, Committee of Presidency, rather than have one President. So, they want to remove Hadi and then talk about the military withdrawals and something like that. While the government position was to always, first, demilitarise and disarm armed groups, that, basically, Houthis submit the weapons and then go through the political process. This was what was being discussed in Kuwait and what is still continuing to be discussed, but the problem that I’m seeing is that the UN-led process, since 2018, is more focusing on humanitarian issues, rather than really discussing these political and military arrangement issues, the formal UN-led process.
Peter Salisbury
And the Kuwait talks, in 2016, the last major political talks between the parties, which you intended, right?
Rasha Jarhum
Yes, that is correct. We were – a number of women were invited to the peace talks in Kuwait. It was only for five days out of 400, I mean, sorry, four months, and this is just to show you how inclusion of women is very minimum, always, and it’s a tick box exercise and symbolic, rather than real participation. So – but the Kuwait was the major milestone, in terms of a really peace negotiation process in the Yemen peace process. After that, everything that came after was only consultations, only very short-term blocks, focusing mainly on confidence-building measures, rather than really discussing the political issues.
The political and military issues are discussed in a parallel track, in track two, mainly, and it’s led by track two organisations, which is good, but we need to move to serious talks in the main track one process, not keep talking about the confidence building measures and the humanitarian issues.
So, it depends on the topic, there is different positions of the parties, and some points, when we see, for example, the salaries issue. The salaries is a very – for me, it sounds like a simple issue, salaries need to be disbursed to the Civil Servants. The government, in 2016, in Kuwait process, proposed that they are going to pay for the Civil Servants, for the list, the Civil Servants’ list of 2014, so before the Houthi takeover of Sannaa and other governorates. And it was discussed, for example, the government said, “The revenues made by the Houthis, they need to pay to the Civil Servants and, then, if there is a gap, then the government can top it off.”
The Houthis, in Stockholm process, this, again, the salaries issues came and was discussed, and not in the main – it was not in the main agreement, but there was discussion about the salaries, and the agreement or concessions about that was that the government will allow oil com – ships to go into the port, a few ships to go into the Port of Hodeidah and the Houthis can sell the fuel and everything, but they need to put the revenues in the Central Bank of Hodeidah and then they need to disbur – use it to, basically, disburse the salaries. This did not happen. The Houthis took the money and they have escalated their military front in Marib and the government has been raising this issue and this is why they are not moving towards their – any collaboration made, basically, with the UN Envoy, because the UN Envoy was the guarantor of that idea, of, basically, the Houthis putting their revenues in the Central Bank and then using it for disbursing their – the salaries.
Now, moving to the other actors, as you have said, Peter, we have the South Transitional Council and they are the main political entity, let’s say, that is openly and is talking and placing – positioning themselves as the carrier for the Southern cause and self-determination and independence. They have been excluded since their formation, even since – even before their formation, Southerners who are with the self-determination agenda, were excluded from the peace talks since the beginning of this conflict. And this is disappointing, because during the National Dialogue process the South issue was a main topic. There was factions from Southerners, who are also the Hirak faction, who is also holding this – I mean, carrying the self-determination cause, were participating in that process and then, suddenly, there is a peace process and they’re completely excluded. What’s happened, what I noticed is every time they are – they were excluded from the UN-led process, they then escalated, whether militarily, or through a political move. So, very recently, for example, when the ceasefire announcement of the plan that Martin Griffiths shared with the parties, basically with the Houthis and the government, and excluding the STC, the STC, the second, like, right after that, announced a self-declaration move of the South. So – and the same before that, every time there was a consultation, peace consultation that excluded STC, we saw some military escalation afterwards, that came after. So, it might not be completely linked, but it feels like every time we are excluding parties that want to be in the process, then we see more escalation, whether politically or militarily.
The same as – the South Transitional Council is not the only peo – faction that’s not included. There is other Southerner groups that needs to be included, for example Hadhramawt [inaudible – 44:15] and this is…
Peter Salisbury
Hadhramawt’s inclusive…
Rasha Jarhum
…also, another Southern faction, yeah, and then, also, Tihamah Resistance, the Al-Islah Resistance, the GPC, the – most of the political parties have been divided now. We have at least two to three faction from the same party, some of them are armed, so these are not, also, included. But again, I’m reminding it’s not about only those who carry the guns that needs to be included in the peace process, because the moment you only limit it to the peace gun-holders, you give them credibility and so it needs to be open and women and civil society needs to be included.
Peter Salisbury
Thank you very much, Rasha, and the next question, which I think that you’re going to be better positioned to answer, Abdi, I’m going to wrap three questions together. So, a question from Valentina, we have a question from Tanya, and we have a question from Audrey and, indeed, Stephen, all asking, you talk about a local Yemeni-Yemeni process. But everybody asks about the extent of the influence of different regional players, “What is the influence of Iran over the process? What is the influence of Saudi Arabia and the UAE and would they allow a true Yemeni-Yemeni process?” seems to be the big question that people are coming to.
Rasha Jarhum
Hmmm, and I believe that the regional actors have a huge role in moving the peace process. They can definitely support, but they are not the only factor. We know, for example, Saudi Arabia has overpower, let’s say, the government, the international recognised government. The UAE has that kind of power over the UAE. Iran had that kind of power over Houthis. But the Yemeni actors are – also have tools that maintains the relationship with these supporters, but also blocking the peace process. It’s not like they have a complete – but the regional actors does not have complete powers to really control the Yemeni actors. So, what we are proposing is that the regional actors, at some point, need to have their own track and need to have their own discussion. And we have seen this, of course, between the Saudis and UAE, there is a lot of harmonisation, and I would never – like, people were saying there is division between UAE and KSA, no, their interest is far larger than having a division that is caused by the Yemeni parties over their own interest, that’s not going to happen. Saudi Arabia and UAE will always have good relations and they will – or think about their interest more than really siding with their Yemeni proxies, let’s say.
For Iran, their support to the Houthis was, you know, diplomatic, political and also support, in terms of oil. We know that fuel is reaching the Houthis for free from Iran. Also, arms, there was many times where ships from Iran were confiscated by the coalition forces that were the original – the origin was from Iran, not – maybe not from a formal source, but more informal, but Iran is supporting, whether technically or militarily, they are supporting the Houthis.
In terms of STC, the Emirates also supporting the STC and – but, again, I don’t feel like the Emirates are supporting the cause, like in terms of self-determination. It’s a strategic alliance, basically, supporting a faction underground that is going to support the interests of Emirates, but it’s not about, really, the cause of – or a self-determination, it’s not supporting the self-determination cost. I don’t know if this makes sense or was helpful. Yeah, if you want me…
Peter Salisbury
I hope so.
Rasha Jarhum
…to elaborate, let me know.
Peter Salisbury
That was great. I mean, with Yemen, as ever, it’s always complex that would – people would love this to be, sort of, a very simple binary conflict, but unfortunately, there are so many players and then interests involved. But that was a really excellent summary, thank you. Thank you so much.
A question for either of you, and maybe we can start with Abdi here, Greg Shapland from Chatham House asks, “While the immediate needs of the Yemeni people are as urgent as they are immense, there are also longer-term challenges to their welfare, including climate change.” And I’d add in there, Yemen’s water resources. And Abdi, the question that he asks is, “What can we do now to address long-term challenges, like climate change, like Yemen’s dwindling water resources and like underdevelopment, even now during the war, can anything be done?”
Abdirahman Ali
Thank you, Peter, and of course, there is something that can be done, but let’s do the first thing first. I think the conflict in Yemen needs to be addressed. However much we try to look at the long-term solutions to the water problems, to the climate issues, we need the stability of the country and we need to bring back the lives that Yemenis deserve and that they had before the conflict. At the moment, the humanitarian crisis is overriding everything. We have been grappling with acute shortages of healthcare services, food, water and sanitation. These are the major things that we are dealing with now. We need, also, not to forget that post-conflict Yemen requires us to preserve the public institutions that look into issues of climate and issues of water resource management.
For instance, the support to the line ministries, support to contain – and maintaining the public institutions that are essential for recovery and development work in Yemen is essential. We continue, as Relief International, to advocate for provision of resources to maintain those institutions, in order for a post-conflict Yemen to look into the broader recovery and development work. But as we speak now, the humanitarian crisis is overshadowing all the things that we should have been looking at, at this stage. The conflict is going into the sixth year and we are unable to provide the very basic to the Yemeni population: healthcare, water sanitation services, protection and food. These remain a priority for now. But I do agree with the questioner that we need to keep these elements in mind, and we need to protect the Yemeni infrastructure and public institutions that will help support this development and long-term vision.
Peter Salisbury
Thank you, and Abdi, I’m going to come back to a comment that Rasha made earlier, and Rasha, I apologise if I summarise this poorly, but her point was that aid agencies, international NGOs, have been working in Yemen for a long time, but they haven’t adequately developed local infrastructure, they haven’t built up local organisations in such a way as to allow them to effectively respond to a crisis like this conflict. Is that an okay summary, Rasha, of your point? Great, thank you. How do you respond to that, Abdi? Obviously, you’ve only been in the country for four years. With the benefit of hindsight, do you think – I’m thinking to the future, as well, do you think that more could have been done to develop Yemenis at the local level, could’ve helped better to respond to this crisis? And do you think, moving forward, that we’ll need to do more to develop local organisations, local NGOs, so that the capacity to respond to these crises and do that development [audio cuts out – 52:52]] over – please go ahead.
Abdirahman Ali
Alright, thank you so much, Peter. I totally agree with Rasha on this element. We need to develop the Yemeni local institutions and organisations. This is not only essential for them to reach those who need their services, but also, it’s a way of passing the skill and an exit strategy for most of the international organisations and the UN operating in Yemen. I totally agree with this. As Relief International, this is one of our priorities in Yemen, to ensure that local actors’ capacities develop and that they take a bigger role in delivery of aid in Yemen. There’s – they have greater acceptance and understanding of the context in Yemen and the need to provide a capacity and support and create a strong partnership with them, it’s an essential thing to do. And as Relief International, we are committed to do this and in spite of our strategy in Yemen, to ensure that there’s local capacity building and enhancement of the work of the local institutions and organisations in Yemen.
Peter Salisbury
Thank you so much.
Rasha Jarhum
Could allow me, Peter, just to add a few aspects in terms of humanitarian. So, I did work on the humanitarian fields before moving towards the peace processes and what we’ve no – you know, we know we – there was the Work Summit, the Humanitarian Summit, it had recommendations, the Grand Bargain, everything. Although, by numbers, it seems like Yemen is meeting this, for example, allocations are being directed to local NGOs, but what we are hearing, from our women partners’ organisations, first of all, they can’t access the UN funding. It’s very difficult. There is huge difficult criteria. They have to have an annual budget of $250,000, which is too much for a local organisation. They have to have two years of operation in the – and the licence, which is also difficult now. It’s not easy to obtain a licence, because the armed groups are shrinking the space and they only want to support the organisations that are loyal to them. We’ve heard from women groups that there was a lot of diversion of aid. They see the aid is being sold in the market, rather than being given to the right holders. There was also reports of the aid ending at the frontlines, where food rations, with international organisations’ logos, is in the frontline.
So, it’s bec – the humanitarian response became, kind of, sponsoring our part of the conflict, rather than really being impartial and really directing. And what we have, and the main issue that we have heard from the women is that the aid itself, in terms of giving food or giving – this is short-term remedy, it’s not long-term remedy. But what we wanted was more sustainable approach into humanitarian response. Something that links, also, development. I know it’s difficult and it’s a fragile context, but we need that aspect. For example, why not support food subsidies? If the food cost is huge for people and they cannot afford it, why not have food subsidies and support the markets with food subsidy? Why not give them an – there was a lot of demand for livelihood opportunities and income generation programmes, rather than giving money or food baskets and something like that, we did not see this.
And we saw the – there was a Yemeni-led campaign about – that was called “Where is the Money?” last year or the year before, that was holding the international organisations accountable and asking, “Where is the money? Where is your reports? Where is the evaluation? Where is” – and only then that the UN started doing some audits and evaluations that were you – most of the time, internal, that’s not even published. There was that report by associated press that showed a lot of corruption in the UN system, in terms of the humanitarian. These thin – if – now, Abdi, I agree with you that aid needs to be increased, but it needs to be conditional on a huge reform to the system and a huge accountability framework, not just an Excel sheet that shows what right holders are saying, or something. It needs to have monitoring system to ensure that it is going to the right holders. Thanks, Peter.
Peter Salisbury
Thank you very much, Rasha. I was about to turn to you, but that was excellent. We’re towards the end of the meeting and we have a couple more questions to address. One I think feeds really well into the point that Rasha has just made and it’s this question of [audio cuts out – 58:01] and pressure. What are the additional factors that might be needed to bring parties, like the Houthis, like the Yemeni Government, different armed actors on the ground, towards a position of [audio cuts out – 58:18] compromise? And Rasha talked about an open political process. Abdi, you talked about international pressure on the parties to allow for [audio cuts out – 58:27] review. Do you have any thoughts on what people listening to this event can do and what you think, in terms of that [audio cuts out – 58:40] – direction that it need [audio cuts out – 5846] issues that need diversion?
Rasha Jarhum
If I may just step in this, your voice, Peter, was a bit interrupting, but I hope I’ve captured the question. So, in terms of the UK and what the UK can do, because the UK is a main actor in the peace process and also a permanent member of the UN Security Council. What I’ve noticed is that, again, there isn’t enough inclusion from the UK side, in terms of civil society and women-led organisations when it comes to the peace process. For example, we know that the UK is leading on drafting UN Security Council that originated to Yemen. We’ve never been consulted about the content of such a resolution. I know this is political and diplomatic and – but it needs to be inclusive. Discussing with the Yemen civil society actors about what they need to see as a priority, how to move forward, this is very important. The UK should do it in an inclusive way.
Now, in terms of what are the things that they can do to move forward? Again, it has to be a bottom up approach. There needs to be a focus on accountability and on disarmament generally. We had an issue there with the arms, even before this war and this is, actually, one of the reasons or one of the early warning signs that showed that Yemen could explode at any moment into war, because we had 60% of the household having firearms, one up to two firearms at home. So, there was never a serious disarmament throw. And we saw UK is supporting this in terms of the disar – demining process, so UK is playing a big role in that and this is very positive, and there is a need for halting arms transfer in general, whether it is illicit or licit arms transfer, to all the actors involved. This is such a priority, because I’m concerned because of the COVID and the economic deterioration that is happening globally, this will lead to even more arms investment. So, I would – if there is a possibility to start diverting to we have – to have a peace driven economy, rather than an arms and weapons based economy, that is how we can reach any kind of stability in the entire region, not only Yemen.
Peter Salisbury
Thank you. Thank you very much, Rasha. The last question I’ll ask, either of you, or both, and we’ve just got a couple of minutes, is we’ve had a couple of questions about any areas of the country that are particularly ripe for local peacebuilding and, also, any success stories. So, Abdi, maybe we can start with you and then we’ll come to Rasha. We hear a lot about what has gone wrong in Yemen and there is a great deal that has gone wrong. What, for you, are the bright spots, can you point to examples of places where there have been, if not positive developments, certainly we’ve seen, sort of, local groups take the initiative and we’ve seen some success stories?
Abdirahman Ali
Thank you, Peter. From my perspective, I think we leave peacebuilding and stability in the whole of Yemen. I think that the Humanist Society is interconnected, and I cannot pinpoint any specific area that I will say we need to put focus on. We need stability across the country and as aid organisations, we are working across the country and we are providing services in each of the areas that have – that need our services across the country. So, we would like to see the stability and the conflict resolution in Yemen considered across the country and not for customs specific areas. This is also because of the fact that the, as I said, the culture of the Yemen, I think Rasha knows better than I do, inside the Yemenis are a people who are connected so much to each other, that you cannot say one area could be focused on or could be piloted with stability than the other. So, for this reason, I will say that we need to focus our energy on a total conflict resolution and stability for the whole of Yemen.
Peter Salisbury
Sure, thank you very much. Rasha, any closing thoughts?
Rasha Jarhum
Sure, yeah, I felt like, usually, in the UN-led process, there is a tendency for oversimplify – simplification, always talking about the national, for examination wide ceasefire, but when you dig deeper, you notice it’s not really a nationwide ceasefire in their definition. It says ‘nationwide’, but it’s not really, because when they talked about nationwide ceasefire, then they talked about only having two political party – two parties, which is, basically, the Houthis and the government, then they are excluding the other armed parties, who are also engaged in other conflicts. So, how would these governorates that are in armed conflict, but with different actors, adhere to this nationwide fire? These questions were not addressed in the draft of the ceasefire plan.
There is a need for localising the peace process, so we need to look at each region. We have regions that are in post-conflict, regions that are in pre-conflict, regions that are in conflict, so we need to look into each region, but in parallel, at the same time. It’s not like first we start with Hodeidah, we invest three or four years in Hodeidah, then we move to Marib, then – no, it needs to be, at the same time, simulate necessary – oh, I – sorry, the words was here before me. So, at the same time…
Peter Salisbury
Okay.
Rasha Jarhum
…to – yes, thank you, Peter – to work on the different conflict areas and what they need. And the same is about what kind of – so, in areas there is a need for recovery, there is a need for security stability, there – in other areas we need to disarm now, we need to address the militia as having weapons. So, there is a need to dig deeper and not choose oversimplified solution, that cookie cutter solution for every region. There is really huge differences that needs to be addressed.
In terms of the positive stories, so we work with the Mothers of Abductees Association. This is the, you know, one of the biggest organisations, women-led organisations working on releasing detainees. They have, since their establishment in 2016, were able to release more than 940 persons who were detained arbitrately – arbitrarily, and this is a huge success. Why? Because the UN-led process, until today, could not free one single man from the exchange list that they have been working on since 2015, and we see women-led local initiatives that lead to that process. The same for we’ve – very recently, after working with the Sanction Committee and a group of eminent experts and connecting them with women who were tortured and arbitrarily detained and the issue was highlighted in the reports that they had, we’ve seen that there was – crimes on child recruitment and sexual-based violence were added to the sanction list. This was for us a huge win to include these two crimes in the sanction list for Yemen and this was happening earlier this year.
The last thing is the women that we work with, the members of the Women’s Solidarity Network, they’re amazing and in doing peacebuilding at the community level. We worked with women who are working on mediating or ending conflict over water resources or land resources, women leading efforts on and even response to the COVID, with their very limited resources, raising awareness and coming up with innovative ways to help the Yemeni people mitigate that – this pandemic. The women are there, but they are not supported. These efforts are there, they have very limited support and money is – when money is spent by the UN to support women, it is restricted to campaigns. They’re telling them, “Do campaign for ceasefire, do” – this is not what Yemeni women need. They need to be supported to – on their local effort that has real impact in ending the war, such as the examples I mentioned. Not only hold the paper and say end the war now, or something like this. Campaigns are important, but they need to be complemented with actual peacebuilding work at the ground.
Okay, so, I’ll end here. Thank you.
Peter Salisbury
Thank you very much, Rasha. Okay, we’ve run out of time and, in fact, we’ve run over a little, but that was such an interesting and rich conversation and I want to thank Abdi and Rasha for being such excellent panellists and contributing to such a rich conversation. I want to thank Chatham House for inviting all of us along. I got a message from Jamila, just a moment ago, apologising that she wasn’t, in the end, able to join us, but, hopefully, next time around she’ll be able to come along. So, thank you to all of you who’ve attended today and have a great day. Thank you very much.
Abdirahman Ali
Thank you, Peter. Thank you…
Rasha Jarhum
Thank you.
Abdirahman Ali
…so much. Good day.
