Yemen President Abdrabbu Mansour Hadi (3rd left), Vice President and Prime Minister Khaled Bahah (2nd left), Secretary General of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) Abdullatif Al-Zayani (4th left); Deputy Secretary General of the Arab League Ambassador Ahmed Ben Helli, UN Envoy to Yemen Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed (2nd right), a number of political parties, organizations of Yemeni society, youths, tribal leaders and social figures attend the three-day conference on Yemen in Riyadh on Sunday. — SPA Saudi Gazette report
RIYADH — Yemeni President Abdrabbu Mansour Hadi urged Sunday the UN Security Council to work on the implementation of resolution 2216 on Yemen. Resolution 2216 was passed in April under Chapter 7 of the UN Charter and imposes sanctions against the leader of the Houthi movement along with Yemen's ousted president Ali Abdullah Saleh. It was unanimously adopted by the session, with Russia being the only member abstaining, without using its veto. Hadi, who was speaking during the opening session of the three-day Yemeni dialogue conference, also said that the Riyadh-based meeting would be the basis for any dialogue or negotiations. Speaking at the conference, Hadi urged a return to the political road map in Yemen through which Saleh stepped down after more than three decades in power following a 2011 Arab Spring-inspired uprising. Saleh's ouster and the road map was backed and overseen by the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council as well as the UN and the US. “This conference taking place today is in support of Yemeni society, and rejects the coup,” Hadi said. Speaking about the Houthis, Hadi said that Yemen's dark forces who have killed civilians and turned Yemeni cities into ghost towns will soon be defeated. He also said that while his government was working on building the country, the Houthis were working on destroying it. The Yemeni president called on the delegates to shoulder their responsibility to save the nation and the people to restore the legitimacy and build a new civilian united state based on justice, equality and legitimacy. He urged them not to waste time in trivial talks and deliberations while their people were suffering in pain and hardship at the hands of the Houthi militias who staged a coup and then launched barbaric attacks on the state and the people. The Yemeni president thanked the Saudi government and people as well as the coalition states for the unwavering support extended to Yemen in its hour of distress. He specially thanked Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Salman for hosting the dialogue conference, and extending $274 million aid in addition to setting up of the King Salman Center for Relief and Humanitarian Work. In his speech, UN Special Envoy on Yemen Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed called for restoring permanent peace in Yemen. “The United Nations endorses that the Gulf Cooperation Council states have a pivotal role in ending the suffering of the Yemeni people and supporting to find a peaceful political solution to the crisis. Hence, it is obligatory to transform the humanitarian truce to a permanent ceasefire and end all hostilities so as to enable the UN to carry out humanitarian work in the strife-torn country.” “I call on all parties to renew their commitment to this truce for five more days at least,” Mauritanian diplomat said. Yemeni Vice President Khaled Bahah said his administration was in favor of extending the truce but a decision on that depended on the situation on the ground. “We need the ceasefire to continue for long, not just for a few days, but it depends on the operation on the ground,” Bahah told Reuters. “There is an effort for an extension, but it depends on how it is on the ground. But it's our wish from the government side that we need to extend it,” he added.
