“The United States continues to support the Saudi-led military aggression against Yemen at all levels. Washington, prior to the recent call for cessation of hostilities in Yemen, had completed an elaborate military preparation for an onslaught on Hudaydah. The US call for a new round of negotiations is, in fact, an attempt to get away from global pressure in the face of the sufferings of the Yemeni people,” Yemen’s Arabic-language al-Masirah television network quoted Mohammed Abdul-Salam as saying on Saturday.
He added that no national Yemeni delegation had so far received a call or invitation from the United Nations or international parties for a new round of negotiations, stressing that the UN was not effective and its decisions were in the hands of other parties.
“The rising military escalation in Hudaydah points to the fact that the Saudi-led coalition has failed to achieve anything and that Yemeni people should put their trust in the Yemeni army and Popular Committees. Today, the Yemeni nation is reaping the fruit of its steadfastness against aggressors,” Abdul-Salam pointed out.
He stressed that the Ansarullah movement welcomed any initiative for inclusive peace in Yemen, which would safeguard the country's freedom and independence.
On Tuesday, US Secretary of Defense James Mattis called for a ceasefire in Yemen and for all parties to come to the negotiating table within the next 30 days.
“We have got to move toward a peace effort here, and we can't say we are going to do it sometime in the future,” he said during a discussion at the United States Institute of Peace (USIP) in Washington.
“We need to be doing this in the next 30 days,” Mattis added.
Saudi Arabia and a number of its regional allies launched a devastating military campaign against Yemen in March 2015, with the aim of bringing the government of former president Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi back to power and crushing the country’s popular Houthi Ansarullah movement.
According to a new report by the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project (ACLED), a nonprofit conflict-research organization, the Saudi-led war has so far claimed the lives of around 56,000 Yemenis.
The Saudi-led war has also taken a heavy toll on the country’s infrastructure, destroying hospitals, schools, and factories. The UN has already said that a record 22.2 million Yemenis are in dire need of food, including 8.4 million threatened by severe hunger. According to the world body, Yemen is suffering from the most severe famine in more than 100 years.
A number of Western countries, the US and Britain in particular, are also accused of being complicit in the ongoing aggression as they supply the Riyadh regime with advanced weapons and military equipment as well as logistical and intelligence assistance.
KD
