Geneva: UN chief Ban Ki-moon on Monday called for an immediate two-week humanitarian pause in Yemen to mark Ramadan as talks got underway in Geneva to try and resolve the bloody conflict.
“I hope this week starts the beginning of the end of the fighting,” Ban said.
“Ramadan begins in two days,” he said, stressing that the holy Muslim month should be a period for “harmony, peace and reconciliation”.
“I have emphasised the importance of another humanitarian pause for two weeks,” Ban said.
Ban dismissed fears that the talks would be torpedoed by the non-arrival of an Iran-backed Al Houthi delegation in time for the talks. The team’s plane was delayed in Djibouti, according to UN and diplomatic sources.
He said the delay was due to logistical reasons and added: “I am pleased to know that the other parties are on their way” and were expected to arrive later Monday.
Underscoring the need for immediate action in Yemen, he said: “The ticking clock is not a time piece, it is a time bomb.”
He also called on all parties to reach agreement on a “comprehensive and lasting” ceasefire.
Yemeni Foreign Minister Riyad Yassin Abdullah said on Monday his government could discuss a limited ceasefire with Al Houthis, but only if the Iran-backed militia withdrew from cities, released more than 6,000 prisoners and complied with a UN resolution.
Abdullah, part of President Abd Rabbo Mansour Hadi’s government in exile in Riyadh, told reporters: “If they start complying with the UN resolution, release prisoners they are holding, more than 6,000, including the defense ministers and others, if they withdraw from Aden and Taiz and other cities and stop killing innocent people, then you can discuss.”
“I’m not very optimistic,” Yassin told AFP, lamenting that the Iran-backed Al Houthi militiamen battling Hadi’s internationally recognised government “never respect any treaty.”
“They don’t even bother to come,” he said.
The Al Houthi delegation had yet to arrive by midday, since its plane was delayed in Djibouti.
That pushed the face-to-face meetings back further, after the talks could not start Sunday as initially planned, due to delays after the militants refused to board a UN-chartered plane that had been scheduled for a stopover in Saudi Arabia.
Yassin also complained that Al Houthis had loaded their plane with far more representatives and advisors than had been agreed up.
“They want to come here to make chaos,” he said.
Yemen has been wracked by conflict between the Al Houthi militiamen and Hadi’s government.
The militants have seized control of large parts of the country including the capital Sana’a, forcing Hadi to flee to Saudi Arabia in February.
Fearing an Iran-friendly regime to its south, Saudi Arabia has led a campaign of air strikes against the militants since March 26 but has so far failed to force them from territory they have seized.
Yassin on Monday compared Al Houthis to the ruthless terrorists of Daesh in Iraq and Syria and Boko Haram in Nigeria.
“The only difference is that they have got support from one country,” he said, pointing out that “Al Houthis have got the support of Iran, and that is where (the whole) problem is coming from.”
Iranian Deputy foreign minister Hussain Amir-Abdollahian was to attend a meeting of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation in Jeddah Monday. The talks were be the first between Iran and Saudi Arabia since the coalition launched air strikes on Al Houthis in March.
