Category Archives: Yemen

Oil trumps human rights as Biden forced to compromise in Middle East

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US president’s attempts to ostracise Saudi crown prince were foiled by a fist bump

For all the careful choreography of Joe Biden’s Middle East tour, the White House made a major miscalculation when the president finally came face to face with Saudi Arabia’s crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, for the first time.

Before Air Force One left Washington, the administration said that Biden would be avoiding physical contact and not shaking hands owing to a rise in Covid cases, a move widely believed to allow him to avoid creating an uncomfortable photo op with the powerful heir to the throne.

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Joe Biden arrives in Middle East at time of rapid change

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Analysis: Israel has transformed itself from regional pariah to ally to many Arab states

Joe Biden has made clear that the Middle East is not a priority for his administration: Ukraine, China and the US midterm elections are all more pressing issues. Still, when Air Force One touches down in Tel Aviv for his first visit to the region as president on Wednesday afternoon, Biden will be faced with a rapidly changing – and still unstable – part of the world.

Biden’s main goal is to convince Saudi Arabia of the need to increase global oil supplies to ease the energy crisis sparked by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. But the fact that he flies directly to Jeddah after two days in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories speaks to a significant shift: Israel’s transformation from regional pariah to ally for many Arab states.

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US looking at new international body to record rights abuses in Yemen

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Rights activist say move is akin to asking Vladimir Putin to investigate Russian war crimes in Ukraine

The Biden administration is exploring the creation of a new international committee to document and report on human rights violations in Yemen, months after a Saudi lobbying campaign quashed an independent United Nations investigation into possible war crimes.

The revelation comes on the eve of a tour of the Middle East by Joe Biden that will include a visit to Israel and – controversially – Saudi Arabia, where the US president has said his aim is to strengthen the “strategic partnership” while also “holding true to fundamental American values”.

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Famine: what is it, where will it strike and how should the world respond?

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A toxic combination of climate emergency, conflict and Covid is pushing some of the poorest countries into an acute hunger crisis

Global hunger toll soars by 150m as Covid and war make their mark

The world is in the grip of an unprecedented hunger crisis. A toxic combination of climate crisis, conflict and Covid had already placed some of the poorest countries under enormous strain, but Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has sent grain and fuel prices soaring.

“We thought it couldn’t get any worse,” said David Beasley, director of the UN World Food Programme (WFP), in June. “But this war has been devastating.”

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US has not fully investigated own role in Yemen human rights abuses, watchdog finds

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Government Accountability Office also criticizes Biden’s move to classify Saudi weapons as ‘offensive’ or ‘defensive’ as meaningless

The US government has not fully investigated its own role in perpetuating human rights abuses in Yemen, according to a congressional watchdog report that offered a damning assessment of both the Trump and Biden administrations’ commitment to tracking violations of humanitarian law.

A report by the Government Accountability Office, which examined US weapons sales to the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen, also raised serious doubts about one of Joe Biden’s first foreign policy as president, when he announced that his administration was ending US support for Saudi offensive operations in Yemen.

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UN appeals to public for $20m to stop feared catastrophic oil spill from tanker

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Vessel off Yemen with more than 1m barrels of oil aboard has been stranded for six years and is close to breaking up

A rare UN appeal to the public to raise $20m is to be launched on Tuesday in an attempt to prevent an environmental catastrophe caused by the potential break-up of an oil tanker off the coast of Yemen.

The money is needed to offload more than 1.14m barrels of oil that have been sitting in the decrepit cargo ship, Safer, for more than six years because of an impasse between Houthi groups and the Saudi-backed government over ownership and responsibility.

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Ex-soldiers ‘inspired by psychic to fight in Yemen’ go on trial in Germany

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Achim Allweyer, 52, and Arend-Adolf Gräss, 60, allegedly tried to form paramilitary unit to join civil war

Two former German soldiers have gone on trial accused of attempting to form a paramilitary group to fight in Yemen’s civil war after being inspired by a psychic.

Achim Allweyer, 52, and Arend-Adolf Gräss, 60, took steps to set up what prosecutors say amounted to a “terrorist organisation” after receiving “messages from a fortune teller that they understood as binding instructions for action”, according to the indictment read out at Stuttgart’s higher regional court on Thursday.

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Britain slashes humanitarian aid by 51% despite global food crisis

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Campaigners say ministers must change course as millions face famine in Africa and the Ukraine war threatens to disrupt global food supplies

Ministers have been accused of choosing the “worst moment in history” to slash the foreign aid budget, as provisional figures showed that UK overseas humanitarian funding was cut by more than half last year.

MPs and charity campaigners say the aid budget urgently needs to be increased to cope with the Ukraine conflict and the risk of famine in Africa. Up to 23 million people face acute hunger in Ethiopia, Kenya and Somalia due to drought.

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UN leads £65m plan to stop huge oil spill off Yemen during first ceasefire in six years

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Decrepit tanker used for storage at risk of creating a disaster worse than Exxon Valdez in 1989

The UN is to stage a rare donor conference on Wednesday in a bid to raise the $80m (£65m) necessary to prevent an ageing oil tanker off the west coast of Yemen exploding and causing an environmental disaster potentially four times worse than the Exxon Valdez spill near Alaska in 1989.

The money is needed to offload more than 1.14m barrels of oil that have been sitting in the decrepit cargo ship, Safer, for more than six years because of an impasse between Houthi groups and the Saudi-backed government over ownership and responsibility.

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British man held for five years in Yemen without charge is freed

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Luke Symons was captured by Houthi rebels and accused of being a spy but was never put on trial

A British man who was held captive in Yemen without charge or trial for five years has been released from jail.

In 2017, Luke Symons, 30, was detained by Houthi rebels at a security checkpoint on suspicion of espionage.

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Exiled Yemen president steps aside as truce raises hopes of end to war

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Abd Rabbu Mansour Hadi says a newly established council will lead negotiations with Iranian-backed Houthis

Yemen’s exiled president has stepped aside and transferred his powers to a presidential council as international and regional efforts to end the country’s long-running civil war gained momentum with a two-month truce.

Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, major players in the conflict, appear to have had a role in Abd Rabbu Mansour Hadi’s decision, quickly welcoming it with a pledge of $3bn (£2.3bn) in aid. The head of the new council has close ties to Riyadh.

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Yemen: two-month ceasefire begins with hopes for peace talks

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UN special envoy Hans Grundberg stresses importance of building on truce in effort to end six-year war

A UN-brokered two-month ceasefire in Yemen was broadly holding on its first full day with oil shipments reaching the port of Hodeida, including some ships that have been barred from entering for 88 days.

The ceasefire is the biggest step forward in the six-year war and is intended to apply inside and outside the country’s borders.

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Yemen’s warring sides accept two-month truce starting with Ramadan

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Agreement comes after significant escalation in bloody conflict between Saudi-led coalition and Houthi rebels

Yemen’s warring sides have accepted a two-month truce, starting with the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, according to the UN envoy to the country.

Hans Grundberg announced the agreement from Amman, Jordan, after meeting separately with both sides in the country’s brutal civil war. He said he hoped the truce would be renewed after two months.

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UK plan to label Houthis as terrorists risks disaster in Yemen, aid bodies warn

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Exclusive: agencies write letter to government after learning home secretary is pushing for designation

Yemen could be afflicted by an even worse humanitarian catastrophe if the UK government goes ahead with a plan to designate the Houthi rebels as a terrorist group, leading aid agencies have warned cabinet ministers in a letter.

The 11 UK agencies are some of those most active in Yemen, and include Save the Children, Care, the International Rescue Committee and Islamic Relief.

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UN condemns attacks by Yemen rebels and Saudi-led coalition

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UN chief António Guterres calls for ‘restraint’ on all sides in seven-year conflict

UN chief António Guterres on Saturday condemned an exchange of attacks between Yemen’s Houthi rebels and the Saudi-led coalition, calling for “restraint” on all sides in the seven-year conflict.

“The secretary-general strongly condemns the recent escalation of the conflict in Yemen,” UN spokesperson Stéphane Dujarric said in a statement Saturday.

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Fire breaks out at Jeddah oil depot ahead of Saudi Arabia grand prix

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Yemen’s Houthi rebels claim responsibility for huge blaze days before F1 race is due to take place

A fire has erupted at an oil depot in Jeddah days ahead of a Formula One race in the Saudi city after what Yemen’s Houthi rebels claimed was an attack by the group.

The blaze – not immediately acknowledged by Saudi Arabia or its state-run oil company Saudi Aramco – was centred on the same fuel depot that the Houthis had attacked in recent days.

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‘Take from the hungry to feed the starving’: UN faces awful dilemma

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Agencies forced to cut back aid in Yemen, Afghanistan, South Sudan and Ethiopia despite growing need as funds go to Ukraine

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has put huge pressure on an already shrinking pot of international aid.

Aid agencies working in countries with the most pressing emergencies, including Yemen, Afghanistan, South Sudan and Ethiopia, are facing difficult decisions on how to spend their money.

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Aid agencies race to get food supplies to Ukrainian cities at risk of siege

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Efforts to stock up Kyiv, Kharkiv and Dnipro are under way as the wider repercussions of the conflict are felt in Yemen and Lebanon

Aid workers are racing to deliver emergency food supplies to Ukrainian cities at risk of “medieval tactics of besiegement”, a spokesperson for the World Food Programme (WFP) has said.

In a dramatic turnaround for a country long hailed as the “breadbasket of the world”, the UN’s emergency food agency is now trying to get stocks into warehouses in Ukrainian cities such as Kyiv, Kharkiv and Dnipro before it is too late, said Jakob Kern.

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‘We need bread’: fears in Middle East as Ukraine war hits wheat imports

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Aid agencies warn of ‘ripple effect’ as soaring wheat prices hit countries already facing inflation, food insecurity and conflict

Concerns are growing across the Middle East and north Africa that the war in Ukraine will send prices of staple foods soaring as wheat supplies are hit, potentially fuelling unrest. Russia and Ukraine supply a quarter of the world’s wheat exports, while Egypt is the world’s biggest importer of wheat.

In Tunisia, like many people queueing for bread in Tunis’s sprawling medina, or old town, Khmaes Ammani, a day labourer, said the rising cost of living was leaving him squeezed. “There’s never any money at the end of the month,” he said. “I even have to borrow some. Everything is getting more expensive.”

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Why Israel faces new dangers in shadow war against Iran if nuclear deal is agreed

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Analysis: a new pact will be worse for Israel than the old one and Iran’s influence in the region has grown in recent years

The US decision to withdraw from the Iran nuclear deal was an immense personal achievement for former Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu. In a leaked video, he boasted that he had personally convinced Donald Trump to scrap the 2015 accord between Tehran and world powers.

“I had to stand up against the whole world and come out against this agreement,” Netanyahu told members of his Likud party in the clip from 2018. “And we didn’t give up.”

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