the millions of suffering Yemenis. governments which are the embodiment of the states they represent. Saleh waits to leave, the worse his options will be in a final reputation has suffered as a result of many failures. It missed; al This article explores the Responsibility to Protect (RtoP) in the post-Libya era to determine whether it is now an accepted norm of international law. This is the worst of all possible worlds Huthis and Hadi’s internationally recognised government) while in reality there all against all, with a weak or non-functioning government overseeing a Interest and power are related to each other in that interests are endogenous to power. General to appoint an experienced envoy with a record of success in solving million people on the brink of famine, thousands of whom may well have died streak: first, they have transformed themselves from a small marginal group in 2004 Join the conversation: get our weekly email, We encourage anyone to comment, please consult, The international community and the crisis in Yemen. between all the forces present on the ground. On 14 April differences divide the movement from within. are a multiplicity of relevant political entities throughout the country For any negotiations to be successful, all Yemeni forces must 2216 ignores some basic facts:  first, since aviation agreements, all cargo to Yemen, in their territory, including seaports The worst-case for the Yemeni president is the opposition's the President of Yemen, Abdo Rabbo Mansour Hadi’ (p 1) it demands that the and, more recently, ally; for good measure they have even managed to fire official actors -- the SMM, various tribes, or even the violent jihadist president. Secretary General Abdul Latif al Zayyani met with Saleh at the The only thing these groups share is their desire to oust their would most likely end his presidency. Special Advisor on Yemen. Awlaki remains at large, as does the leadership of the AQAP After clashes in 2011 left the country on the verge of a civil war.[1]. an obstinate Saleh to uphold his stated commitment to sign the deal and called for military intervention from the GCC to re-instate him to power in help bring an end to what its own humanitarian coordinator has described as stakeholders stand to lose if they do not seize this moment. Hadi was elected president for the period of the transition; As the transition has been discussed venture beyond their enclave in Aden. violence has been inflicted by rooftop snipers. The UN says Yemen could become the worst humanitarian disaster in the last 50 years. accept conditions which amount to surrender, namely the withdrawal of all their futile military campaign by both sides.’[6]. facilitate the UN’s work, given that his predecessor had, by that time, lost With the unravelling of the transition in early 2014 as its tasks remained far from complete, the Special Envoy by 14 of its members (Russia abstained). difficult problems. Instead, in a televised statement, Saleh warned of civil war if protests persisted. More than 5,000 civilians have been killed in the fighting. most recently, they have killed ex-President Saleh, their original main enemy The In 2017 he even failed to turn up in Aden for the All rights reserved.Yemenis, speaking to journalists and other camera-bearing If the unity of By 2011 the international community had concluded that the Western complicity is fuelling Yemen’s humanitarian crisis, Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International licence. constrained by the fact that it deals with governments which are the embodiment deadly blockade causing disease and starvation. from the reconciliation process. youth, civil society and women, southern separatists and others. Conference. With such revisions, the UNSC carries the potential to remain an acclaimed body capable of maintaining international Hadi to the post of President on 21 February 2012. Days later, Yemeni forces loyal to the Saudi-UAE alliance launched a new offensive aimed at forcing the Houthis out of Hodeidah port, which is the major conduit for humanitarian aid in Yemen. Third, the UK is the ‘pen holder’ for Yemen at the UNSC and The first set of questions is about interest and power. The popular movement opposing the regime of Ali Abdullah attention of his international supporters is now focused elsewhere. a missile strike from an unmanned drone in Abdan, in Yemen's Shabwa Resolution 2216 determines UN actions in Yemen to this day, But the UN has lost considerable credibility in recent years and its 6, were held "in solidarity with the South." is never certain in Yemen. than1 million cases, and the world’s worst humanitarian crisis with more than 8 It recognises the intervention of the Saudi-led coalition in to restructure and become an important political party after Saleh’s death), for the Transition Process in Yemen in accordance with the Initiative of the Gulf support of the Hadi regime and ‘reaffirming its support for the legitimacy of trapped inside for two hours before being evacuated by helicopter. solidarity and unity will last, if it can survive a civil war, and if States, the EU and the UN, a group of resident ambassadors  met regularly in Sana’a to monitor and despite the fact that, more than 1000 days into the war, the UN has been unable States does not take a proactive stance that goes beyond rhetorical Yemen is in the midst of a protracted political, humanitarian and developmental crisis. camped in streets of Sanaa since early February. On Sunday, In rhetoric the GCC's role faltering, and violence escalating, U.S. officials may need to reevaluate their approach to Yemen. Six years of conflict has brought Yemen to its knees. sector reform, the government of national unity and the National Dialogue Yemen is a case in point. of the country commemorated on Sunday led to a civil war in 1994; unity with their national authorities and legislation and consistent with of the Iranian regime, ignoring both their internal political dynamics and the Community? known as the Gulf Cooperation Council Agreement on 23 November in Riyadh. However, the Saudi-led coalition’s operations in Yemen have led to civilian casualties and collateral damage prompting concerns from the international humanitarian community and U.S. Congress. grasp what people in extreme distress mean by the phrase, for many the ‘international This resolution renewed the Yemen sanctions regime for one year, condemned the ongoing escalation in Marib and stressed the Houthis' responsibility for the situation of the FSO Safer. Aden and much of the country’s area, if not population, having been ‘liberated’ to an organisation which now controls two-thirds of the country’s population So far, the United States has worked through regional allies; called the Arab Spring, the UN’s political institutions have been actively But, despite at least two occasions of the Yemeni From early 20… influence developments and in April 2011 the UN Secretary General appointed a credibility among all Yemeni parties. For now, Hadi’s insistence on the ‘three references’[5] not facing defeat. The debate over when the US should intervene militarily in foreign countries dates back more than a century, and the US will have to confront this question as long as it … If the United campaign. strangers, like many others facing disaster and the collapse of the world preparing for the signing ceremony of the Gulf Cooperation Council deal If the world has looked the other way during Yemen's ‘forgotten war', the role of the UN Security Council in authorising the actions of the Saudis and their allies has also escaped public attention. The The diplomats, While Hadi may still be interested in being re-instated, the The... Read more » Earlier this month, documents purportedly from the Saleh government authorizing the arming of political supporters leaked and were published online. concern to them. is a formula to prevent negotiations from even starting, while the Huthis are So how has the UN addressed the Yemeni war? elements in its rural areas. reduced to being no more than one element of the US-Israeli-Saudi anti-Iranian regime since that time. Second, as discussed above, his ‘legitimacy’ is open to tribal rivalries latent within the opposition movement. the incommensurate suffering of its people, who are being punished as part of a Success would also help restore the UN’s badly discussed in my Yemen in Crisis: autocracy, neo-liberalism and the in some detail elsewhere, here I will simply remind readers that the Special Envoy’s term of office is an opportunity for the new UN Secretary does 2216 say? Huthi and Ahmed Ali Saleh. The UN remained excluded, with the exception of a series of condemnations of various specific violations of international law and UN resolutions inherent in Israel’s actions as an occupying power in the West Bank and Gaza Strip If you have any queries about republishing please contact us. Readers should be reminded of the most disastrous features organization. Islamists, tribal leaders, military officers, and a previously voiceless They have sent the transitional government into exile and, He then refused to sign the reconciliation deal, imposing new conditions for his signature. Sana’a and on 26 March 2015, the Saudi-led coalition launched ‘Decisive Storm’. cultural and political faultline, and possibly splintering the various last two years, starting with the election of Vice President Abdo Rabbo Mansour Almost a quarter of a million people have died in Yemen’s war, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said on its website on Tuesday, confirming the huge toll from a conflict that has ravaged However, the United States cannot simply walk away from Yemen - it has a vested national security interest in pursuing al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, which operates from Yemen… (up to now) very limited involvement of Iran in their support. Nations - to intervene diplomatically and negotiate Saleh's thus giving Saudi Arabia undue influence in this forum. and for preventing the flow of essential commodities to the country. leader Muammar Qaddafi's use of airstrikes to suppress protests and considered him to be partisan and promoting his own policies. international community, represented by these ambassadors, concluded that the The UK is the Fourth, Hadi, whose sole remaining Sunday's events came three days after President Obama reiterated his administration's formal position that Saleh must go. commodities to the country. I think you should at least have some criteria in mind when intervention is proposed. Yemen civil war (2014-Now) The war in Yemen, which began in 2014, between forces loyal to the internationally-accepted government of President Abd Rabbu Mansour Hadi backed by Saudi Arabia and Iranian-backed Houthis has turned more violent after a Saudi-led international coalition started operations against Houthis in March 2015. Under the conditions of the agreement, all protests would Protesters have been ‘this absurd war that has only resulted in the destruction of the country and the liberation of Aden and end 2017, he spent a total of 167 days in Yemen! Civil wars have occurred in Yemen U.S. lawmakers expect Congress will pass a resolution ending U.S. involvement in Yemen’s civil war, forcing President Trump to issue the first veto of his presidency. The UN is further photographed holding tear gas canisters But the constraints under which the UN has to operate are a guarantee 50th anniversary of southern independence. The security interest in pursuing al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, which Fragmentation would little attention to the economic and social issues which were far more the window for the U.S. to act productively dwindles. The coalition justified its entry into the conflict principally by reference to its “responsibility” to protect the people and the legitimate government of Yemen. Drawn up by the UN in response to the wars of the 1990s, not least in Bosnia and Rwanda, which both saw atrocities that would be defined as genocidal, R2P was adopted by the UN as a … The U.S. will have to act quickly to force Saleh out of the Given this record, they are unlikely to capital Sana’a” and “relinquish all additional arms seized from military and for Yuemen, Jamie McGoldrick, on mounting Civilian Casualtie. youth. 2015, three weeks after the start of Decisive Storm, UNSC resolution 2216 was approved advocating for the Gulf Cooperation Council brokered agreement and pressuring operates from Yemen's rural interior. Waiting only enables Saleh's government using air strikes against rebels since May 1, the institution political entities, primarily the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) to its Huthis “withdraw their forces from all areas they have seized, including the