UAE announces suspension of its operations in Hodeidah, the Houthi replies
Yamanyoon
The United Arab Emirates (UAE) suspended, today, its military operations in Hodeidah in support of UN envoy Martin Griffith’s efforts to achieve an unconditional withdrawal of Ansarullah, the so-called Houthis, from the city of Hodeidah and its port.
“The coalition welcomes the continued efforts of UN Special Envoy Martin Griffith to achieve an unconditional withdrawal of the Houthis from the city of Hodeidah and the port,” said Anwar Gargash, its foreign affairs minister, in a series of tweets.
“We have temporarily stopped our campaign to give these efforts sufficient time, and we hope that it will succeed,” he said, accusing the international community of not putting enough pressure on the Houthis to meet the conditions set by the coalition.
“If the UAE is sincere in stopping their aggression against Hodeidah, we are ready to communicate to discuss how to get their mercenaries out of the siege there,” Houthi said in a tweet on his Twitter account.
For its part, a military source said that the declaration of the UAE is misleading because the fighting in #the West Coast at the moment does not allow it to fight in the city of Hodeidah, pointing out that the US-Saudi-led coalition continues its attacks to lift the siege on its followers in #the West Coast to be able to attack Hodeidah.
Hodeidah is a strategic port city which should be supporting more than 20 million Yemenis. It should be the source of at least 70 percent of all imports to Yemen,” Suze van Meegen, a protection and advocacy adviser with the Norwegian Refugee Council, told AFP. The US-Saudi-led coalition has been eager to retake from Yemeni joint forces control, according to Yemeni officials. But the former UN special envoy to Yemen, Ismail Ould Cheik, warned against attacking the port city over potential catastrophic consequences to Yemen last year. Martin Griffiths, the new special envoy to Yemen, echoed the same concern over attacking Hudaydah at the UN Security Council.
Abdulmalik al-Houthi, the leader of the Houthi(Ansarallah) movement, which is the main force that faces the coalition, said on a TV speech ,” The decision of invading the Yemeni, western coast, has been taken and adopted by the United States of America, noting that the Saudis are trying to abolish Yemen’s freedom,” stressing that it was the people of Yemen’s right to defend their country.
“We are increasingly concerned by the fighting in Hodeidah,” UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric said at a press conference held on Wednesday.
Dujarric also warned of the repercussions’ consequences on the humanitarian situation
“The occurrence of a battle in Hodeidah, in the west of Yemen, could lead to the destruction of the port, which in turn will send millions to starvation,” said the British newspaper, The Independent.
Even if the UK warned against attacking the vital port of Hodeidah, we bear responsibility for the horrors of this war, according to a report issued by the Guardian on June 17.