In Yemen, a Pause in Fighting Raises Hopes for Peace Talks
SOURCE: THE NEW YORK TIMES
BY: MARGARET COKER
ABU DHABI, United Arab Emirates — When the United Arab Emirates began the battle last month to seize the strategic Yemeni port city of Al Hudaydah, Emirati officials were confident of a quick victory, brushing aside international warnings of a potential humanitarian catastrophe and boasting that their military and local proxy forces could oust the opposing Houthi rebels.
But the challenges of urban warfare have stalled the offensive, and amid a flurry of diplomatic activity aimed at stopping the impoverished Arab country’s grueling civil war, the U.A.E. temporarily halted the fight for the city, Emirati and international diplomats said on Sunday.
The battle for control of Al Hudaydah set off a major international diplomatic outcry over concern for the safety of the city’s 600,000 residents and the threat that the fighting could disrupt supply lines for urgent humanitarian assistance to eight million others in Yemen.
The United Nations has declared Yemen as the world’s worst humanitarian disaster. Aid arriving into the Red Sea port accounts for about 70 percent of imports in a country where two-thirds of the 29 million people rely on international aid.
A senior Emirati official said the pause in military action was aimed at giving United Nations negotiations a chance to succeed.
“We have paused our campaign to allow enough time for this option to be fully explored,” Anwar Gargash, the U.A.E. minister of state for foreign affairs, said in a Twitter posting on Sunday.
On one side Saudi Arabia and the U.A.E. are supporting the ousted president, Abdu Rabbu Mansour Hadi, and their myriad proxy forces control large swathes of southern Yemen. They are opposed by the Houthi rebels, who control Al Hudaydah and the capital, Sana, and are backed by Iran.
These outside powers are training and equipping their proxies, and, in the case of the Arab coalition, they are also actively engaged in the fighting.
On the battlefield the opposing forces are deadlocked and, until recently, both the Arab coalition and the Houthi leadership have been scornful of a peace process and have rejected a return to talks mediated by the United Nations, which have been moribund for two years.
But diplomatic pressure over the offensive, including from American officials, has injected new life into a possible cease-fire and peace deal, according to two diplomats familiar with the process. The two officials were not authorized to speak on the record to the media because of the sensitivity of the talks underway among United Nations officials, the Houthi leadership, the Emirati and Saudi governments and Mr. Hadi, who is supported financially by the Saudis.
Over the last week, Martin Griffiths, the United Nations special representative for Yemen, has been meeting with both Houthi leaders and Mr. Hadi, while other senior officials from the organization have been briefing Saudi and Emirati officials about a possible cease-fire, according to the two officials.
United Nations officials are also working to cement an agreement that would have the international body take over management of the Al Hudaydah port.
At the start of the battle for the city, Emirati officials said they had two key goals: controlling Al Hudaydah’s port and airport. The hope was the victory would be substantial enough to force the Houthis to sue for peace and give the Saudi- and Emirati-backed Yemeni factions a stronger role in future political negotiations.
While the Emirati-backed force has gained control of the airport, it has not launched its naval assault of the port, because of what Emirati officials say is heavy mining. American officials last month refused an Emirati request to help demine the waters around the city.
Another reason for the slowed offensive is that Emirati officials have said they do not want to engage in urban warfare, as they and their local proxies are not equipped to handle street-to-street combat.
Casualties on both sides, so far, have been much lower than many had feared in the battle for the city, and the pause in combat has raised hopes that the fight over Al Hudaydah could end without large numbers of dead.
Still, some Mideast diplomats caution that fighting could re-erupt at any time, especially as Emirati officials have said they do not have total control over their Yemeni proxy fighters.
At the same time that the U.A.E. was announcing a halt to fighting, the Emiratis are facing rising controversy over reports by The Associated Press that the Arab nation has been overseeing detention centers in Yemen in which prisoners have been tortured.
On the Houthi side, criticism is rife among Yemenis for the amount of civilian suffering within the areas controlled by the rebels.
Mr. Griffiths is scheduled meet the Houthis again on Monday in the Yemeni capital, and possibly Mr. Hadi in the southern city of Aden. The two diplomats say that Mr. Griffiths hopes to schedule a briefing for the Security Council by the end of the week to codify a possible cease-fire and a new round of peace talks.
