Senior State Department Official On Developments in Yemen

Office of the Spokesperson

Washington, D.C.

Press Correspondents’ Room

SENIOR STATE DEPARTMENT OFFICIAL:  So I thought I’d just give a few toplines and then move in whatever direction you all want to.  The U.S. is continuing to work with partners in the region to move Yemen toward stability.  Meanwhile, we’ve got Iran, al-Qaida, ISIS continuing to destabilize Yemen.  And so I sort of think of our main issues in three categories: counterterrorism, the southern split, and the Houthi conflict.  So just a couple of words on all those.

On counterterrorism, the U.S. is working closely with our partners in the region, chiefly the legitimate government of Yemen – the Hadi government that’s recognized by the UN – Saudi Arabia, and the UAE, and a few others.  Al-Qaida and ISIS in Yemen have shown that they can threaten the United States and the international community.  There have been some important successes in the counterterrorism fight recently.  Most prominently you saw – I’m sure you all saw the White House announcement about the killing of al-Rimi near Marib.

On the southern conflict, we’ve congratulated the Saudis for their work in coming up with the Riyadh agreement between the legitimate Yemeni Government and the Southern Transitional Council.  The agreement brought to an end the fighting that broke out last August.  Unfortunately, the agreement – the remainder of it hasn’t been implemented.  Most importantly, it had a political component that was supposed to bring more southern politicians into the Yemeni Government, as well as various parties giving up their weapons, demilitarizing Aden.   That’s still moving ahead very slowly.  The Saudis are working on that.  The U.S. is engaging with both the Yemeni Government and the STC to urge them to implement the agreement.  I’m optimistic it will eventually be implemented, but it’s going to be slow.

And then lastly on the Houthis, Iran is continuing to send advanced weapons into Yemen.  We saw that most recently with a dhow that was intercepted off the coast of Yemen.  CENTCOM did some press on that last week.  It shows that Iran is continuing to send components for advanced missiles, for UAVs, and other weapons that are enabling the Houthis, among other things, to threaten Saudi Arabia to launch these missiles and UAVs at civilian airports, desalination plants, and potentially to again threaten American citizens, as they did a couple of years ago when missiles were exploding over Riyadh fairly regularly.

We continue to support the efforts of the UN Special Envoy Martin Griffiths.  He’s got a very tough task, but he’s – I think he’s making – he’s continuing to make a bit of progress.  Most recently there were the mercy flights that he organized.  We supported him in that.  They brought a couple of planeloads of critically ill people from Sanaa to Oman for treatment in hospitals there.  We’re hoping that that can be expanded.

Also, Griffiths has managed to bring the parties together for another meeting concerning prisoner releases.  That was last week, I believe, in Oman.  This is the third time that the parties have agreed on prisoner releases.  The first two agreements didn’t really go anywhere.  This time they are continuing to talk – I think today’s supposed to be the last day of meetings where the two parties are exchanging lists of prisoners.  And this is where it’s always broken down in the past.  They disagreed over who should be exchanged or who was even really one of their people.  But both of these are – I’m not going to try to exaggerate them.  They’re not breakthroughs, but they are confidence-building measures that’s keeping both parties engaged and keeping Griffiths engaged.

Meanwhile, there have been some efforts at de-escalation between the Saudi-led coalition and the Houthis.  That’s something we support.  It was looking very hopeful back in December.  There had been a couple of upticks in violence in January and February, but the Saudi-led coalition has said that they – they’re still interested in pursuing de-escalation.  The Houthis – they’re kind of hot and cold.  There were some engagements around Nehem east of Sanaa.  And of course, each side claims the other started it, but regardless of who started it, I think the Houthis responded in a disproportionate way, and they ended up with a serious military push eastward.  That seems to have stabilized now, but it’s this kind of thing, along with the continuing UAV and missile strikes into Saudi Arabia that are threatening de-escalation.

And then I’ll just say a brief word on the humanitarian situation.  I believe in AID did a briefing last week.

Anyway, I mean for the technical aspect of this you might want to talk to AID, but more broadly there’s a consensus among the UN agencies, NGOs, and the major donors that the way the Houthis have been treating the relief effort and the relief actors has risen to the point where it can’t be tolerated anymore.  So this came from the implementors and the UN agencies, and the U.S. has joined this international consensus.  It was reinforced at some meetings in Brussels that was talking about.

So where we are now is that the – each donor and each implementer is drawing up plans on how to – what to do if the Houthis do not change their behavior on the ground.  And the plans involve suspending a lot of assistance programs, with exceptions for truly lifesaving programs – feeding sick children and things like that.  But it’s the Houthis themselves have made it impossible for the implementers to continue providing assistance on the ground and still adhering to international relief principles.

So our hope is that the Houthis will change their behavior on the ground so there won’t be – it won’t be necessary for anyone to suspend assistance.  But as I said, there is an international consensus now that it’s necessary to suspend assistance where the Houthis make it impossible to do it and still remain true to international relief principles.

So that’s basically what I wanted to say at the top.  And then I’d be happy to go further into areas that might interest you.

MODERATOR:  Okay.

QUESTION:  Can I  —

MODERATOR:  Go ahead.  Oh.

QUESTION:  Oh.

MODERATOR:  Why don’t you let —

QUESTION:  Why don’t —

MODERATOR:  Go ahead, John.

QUESTION:  Sure.  Well, can I just pursue the lost point that you made, where you’re saying that there’s the consensus internationally that where the Houthis make it impossible for relief aid?  Can you explain that a bit?  Is that the issue of what they call the taxation on the relief?  And can you say what, if any, contact there is with the Houthis on the humanitarian aspect and also more broadly about reaching a peace settlement?

SENIOR STATE DEPARTMENT OFFICIAL:  Yeah, I think AID can explain to you in better detail than I can exactly the conditions that the Houthis need to meet.  I think that the 2 percent tax is sort of the most famous measure they’ve imposed.  I’m told that through this and other measures they’re extracting considerable sums of money out of the international relief effort.  They’ve also been doing things like harassing, even torturing implementing staff, diverting aid toward groups and areas that they favor and away from groups that they disfavor, trying to force the implementers to sign agreements that would commit them to taking Houthi direction on how their activities are implemented.

All these are things that at a minimum most governments, including the U.S., can’t allow their funds to be used this way.  So again, there is actually – unusually for Yemen – a pretty solid consensus on – that these things are unacceptable.

On communications with the Houthis, there’s no lack of that.  The UN – they have senior people resident in Sanaa who have been raising these issues with the Houthis for months and months.  The donors have sent letters to the de facto Houthi administration, signed by all the major donors.  A number of European governments have had ambassadors visit Sanaa and convey the same message.  So I don’t think there’s any – I don’t think the Houthis have any doubt about what we expect them to do.

MODERATOR:  Matt, go ahead.

QUESTION:  The administration talks quite a bit about the maximum pressure campaign on the ground and how it’s having an impact (inaudible).  From your vantage point, it sounds as though there isn’t really much of an impact, at least in terms of Iran support for the Houthis.  Is that correct?  Or are you seeing some kind of diminishment, some kind of – or increase in that?

SENIOR STATE DEPARTMENT OFFICIAL:  I think Iran’s support to Houthis, especially in areas like sending advanced weapons, is continuing without any diminution.  They might even be stepping it up.  I think that demonstrates that the Iranian Government cares more about these foreign adventures than it does about the well-being of its people at home, that at a time when they are under – their economy clearly is in serious trouble, they’re continuing things like support to the Houthis in Yemen.

MODERATOR:  Go ahead, Michel.

QUESTION:  Yeah.  Two questions.  Is Prince Khalid taking over the Yemeni file, helping Griffith process, first?  And second, did the UAE withdrawal from the south and from Yemen help too?

SENIOR STATE DEPARTMENT OFFICIAL:  Well, first on the internal dynamics of the Saudi Government, I don’t think I should get into that.  The Saudis, everyone knows, are the key player in Yemen.  They lead the coalition, and the U.S. engages closely with them on Yemen issues, but it’s at many levels of the Saudi Government.

On the UAE, the UAE has announced publicly that it’s – it feels that it can continue its support for the Saudi-led coalition without anywhere near the number of troops on the ground they had before.  The UAE has said publicly that they’ll continue to support the Saudi-led coalition but by supplying the various Yemeni forces that they’ve trained, through humanitarian aid, in other ways.  But you’re right; they have withdrawn by now, I think, almost all of their forces.

MODERATOR:  Go ahead, Humeyra.

QUESTION:  Can I follow up on the aid?  You said that donors and others are now pulling up plans to potentially suspend if Houthis don’t change behavior.

SENIOR STATE DEPARTMENT OFFICIAL:  Right.

QUESTION:  Do you have like a timeline for that?  That’s like one of the, if not the biggest aid operation in the world.

SENIOR STATE DEPARTMENT OFFICIAL:  Right.

QUESTION:  And you’re talking about potentially like closing – not closing it down but like reducing it.

SENIOR STATE DEPARTMENT OFFICIAL:  Right.

QUESTION:  What is the timeline for that if things don’t improve?

SENIOR STATE DEPARTMENT OFFICIAL:  Well, actually, I should have said there have already been some activities that have been suspended because the Houthis made it impossible for implementers to continue.  But yeah, the – more broadly, they’re drawing up plans for suspension.  I think everyone’s looking at a timeline of a month or two, soon, before – that’s the point at which different donors will start – or different implementers will start to suspend some of their programming.

QUESTION:  And the stuff that you said some of it has been suspended, what are they?

SENIOR STATE DEPARTMENT OFFICIAL:  I don’t really know the specifics —

QUESTION:  Okay.

SENIOR STATE DEPARTMENT OFFICIAL:  — but AID might be able to help you with that.

MODERATOR:    Robbie, go ahead.

QUESTION:  I was going to ask about that as well.  So there’s a solid consensus that the way the Houthis are treating humanitarian aid in areas it controls is unacceptable, but is there a solid consensus among donors of how to respond?

SENIOR STATE DEPARTMENT OFFICIAL:  Right.

QUESTION:  Do our other allies – the Europeans, the Brits, et cetera – agree with the U.S. that potentially we have to suspend sending relief to those areas?

SENIOR STATE DEPARTMENT OFFICIAL:  Broadly speaking, yes.  And it’s not so much it’s agreeing with the U.S.  Again, the – this initiative came from the UN agencies and the implementers, and the UN joined that – the U.S. supported that approach.  There was a meeting in Brussels that attended and briefed about last week among most of the donors and implementers, and it’s not – they’re not in lockstep, but in – broadly, there is a consensus that there needs to be – that the international community needs to respond to what the Houthis are doing.

MODERATOR:  Conor.

QUESTION:  Hey.  Conor Finnegan with ABC.  You said in an answer to Matt’s question that Iran had increased its support for the Houthis, perhaps, in the last few months or so.  Previously, senior officials here had talked about an effort to sort of divorce the Houthis from the Iranians, to convince them that they had to be part of the solution in Yemen, that they should reduce their reliance on the Iranians.  Can you give us any update on that effort and whether or not you’ve had some success in pushing that message to them?

SENIOR STATE DEPARTMENT OFFICIAL:  Yeah, first of all, my assessment that the Iranians are committed to providing destabilizing advanced weapons to the Houthis – my assessment is that that’s increased over the past several years.  I mean, three years ago – they’re providing things now – we’re seeing things explode over Saudi airports that weren’t present three years ago.

And then as for – yes, I think there are elements within the Houthi movement who recognize that their link to Iran isn’t in their interest.  I mean, I think the most famous example of that was when the Iranians attacked the Saudi facilities at Abqaiq and the other place, and they got the Houthis to publicly claim credit for it, claim responsibility for it, even when it’s been clearly proven that these – those UAVs came from Iran, those missiles came from Iran and not from Yemen.  And we saw that there were a number of people in Yemen, even within the Houthi movement, who were unhappy with that.  So I think there is the potential there to encourage elements of the Houthi movement to recognize that being linked to Iran is not in their interest.  But —

MODERATOR:  And just to follow up on that, that’s not just a U.S. policy.  That’s led by UN Envoy Martin Griffiths that all our allies support, we support.  We continue to support him in those efforts.  So the only thing I would add to color to that is that that’s a UN-led policy that we’re incredibly supportive of.

I think Kim and then behind me.  Sorry, we’ll try to get to everybody.

QUESTION:  Michelle.

MODERATOR:  Michelle.  I know.  I was trying to think of Jennifer, Michelle.

QUESTION:  Keep noting the time.  I wanted to ask for some update on the strength of al-Qaida and ISIS given that you’ve taken some major folks off the battlefield.  Are they still resilient as a network and can they plot things outside of Yemen, or are they pretty hemmed in by the fighting?

SENIOR STATE DEPARTMENT OFFICIAL:  I think the counterterrorism specialists would tell you that they are still a potential threat to the U.S. and to the international community, as they have demonstrated in the past.  But I think, as you said, there’s also been significant progress against them.  We’ve seen them fighting each other.  They were – over the past year or so, they were pushed out of a number of areas by Yemeni Government forces, by local allies of the UAE or the Saudis.  So they’re under serious pressure, but the problem is nowhere close to being solved.  It’s going to require continued U.S. commitment.

QUESTION:  When you said they’re fighting, do you mean within AQ or between AQ and ISIS?

SENIOR STATE DEPARTMENT OFFICIAL:  We’ve seen factions of both groups fighting with each other, fighting among themselves.  Yeah.

MODERATOR:  Makes me miss being a CT analyst.

QUESTION:  I just have a question about Hadi.  Is the U.S. still wedded to Hadi as being the leader of this whatever government?

SENIOR STATE DEPARTMENT OFFICIAL:  Well I don’t think the U.S. is wedded to any foreign leader, but Hadi is the – he’s recognized as the head of the legitimate Yemeni Government, recognized by the UN, by I think every government in the world except Iran.  So it’s up to the Yemenis to decide how to work out their leadership.  He is a partner to the U.S., a partner to the Saudis, so we’ll continue to work with him.

MODERATOR:  Jennifer.

QUESTION:  Do you have any update on the investigation into unauthorized transfers of U.S. arms to militia groups in Yemen by the Saudi-led coalition?

And then secondly, what is the U.S. doing to pressure the coalition to combat civilian casualties?  We saw more than two dozen killed a few weeks ago in a strike.

SENIOR STATE DEPARTMENT OFFICIAL:  Yeah.  On the first one, I don’t have any updates for you.  I think you’d want to address that to our UAE or Saudi desks.

On civilian casualties, yes, there was, I think, 30 people killed last week in a Saudi strike, I believe.  The Saudis, within a few hours, admitted that they had done this and that they had made a mistake and that they were going to investigate it.  We’ll have to see how the investigation turns out and whether it’s credible, but I think that’s an improvement over what was happening a couple of years ago when the Saudi-led coalition would generally deny whenever something happened, whether they were at fault or not.

And over the past year or so, they have – they’ve developed a process modeled on the U.S. process for dealing with civilian casualties incidents.  It’s not perfect, but it is – they’re carrying out investigations.  So yes, I think their – the short answer is yes, their handling of these kinds of incidents has improved.

MODERATOR:  Okay, last one.  Go ahead.

QUESTION:  So al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula are now confirming their leader was killed by the U.S.  Is there a concern that al-Qaida will start attacking U.S. interests or increasing their attacks on U.S. interests in the region in retaliation?

SENIOR STATE DEPARTMENT OFFICIAL:  I don’t think al-Qaida’s desire to attack the U.S. is – I don’t think they ever dial it down from 11.  So —

MODERATOR:  That would be the whole point.

SENIOR STATE DEPARTMENT OFFICIAL:  Right.  So I think it’s a positive thing that this very violent man is removed, but there are more like him out there.  And so that’s why the counterterrorism effort is going to have to continue.

QUESTION:  Is the replacement a target now as well?

SENIOR STATE DEPARTMENT OFFICIAL:  I – first of all, I’m not working directly with the CT effort, and if I were, I probably wouldn’t be allowed to talk about that anyway.

QUESTION:  You’re not actually piloting the drones yourself from a little bunker?

SENIOR STATE DEPARTMENT OFFICIAL:  No, thank you.  Yeah.

MODERATOR:  Okay.  So we have —

QUESTION:  There is a parliamentarian delegation?

MODERATOR:  You all guys always try to get – when I say last question, everyone’s not – Matt’s normally the naughty one.  Michel, you’re being the naughty one?

QUESTION:  No, I am not it?

QUESTION:  I do have one that’s completely —

MODERATOR:  Matt.

QUESTION:  There is the Yemeni parliamentarian delegation —

MODERATOR:  Let him get out first, Matt.

QUESTION:  — in Washington?

SENIOR STATE DEPARTMENT OFFICIAL:  Sorry?

QUESTION:  A parliamentarian delegation —

SENIOR STATE DEPARTMENT OFFICIAL:  There are some members of parliament here currently, yeah.

QUESTION:  Any mission?  Or do you know what are (inaudible) —

SENIOR STATE DEPARTMENT OFFICIAL:  No, I mean, this was arranged by the Yemeni Government through their embassy here.  I think it’s a good thing when Yemeni members of parliament can come here and learn about how things are done here and also present their side of the story.

QUESTION:  Thank you.

MODERATOR:  Okay.

QUESTION:  Great, thanks for coming.

SENIOR STATE DEPARTMENT OFFICIAL:  Thank you.

MODERATOR:  Yeah, thank you very much.  Matt.

QUESTION:  Is there anything big internationally coming up on – well, I’m just curious if has got some conference or meetings planned.

MODERATOR:  I’m too tired to fight.

QUESTION:  Is there anything on the – in the coming month or so that’s —

SENIOR STATE DEPARTMENT OFFICIAL:  I’m not – I’m not tracking anything like that, no.

QUESTION:  Okay.

MODERATOR:  Okay, thank you.

SENIOR STATE DEPARTMENT OFFICIAL:  Okay, all right.  Thanks.

 

* This article was originally published here

HELP STOP THE SPREAD OF FAKE NEWS!

SHARE our articles and like our Facebook page and follow us on Twitter: