Lieutenant General Abhijit Guha Commences Mission as Head of UNMHA

United Nations Special Envoy to Yemen Martin Griffiths beside Lieutenant General Abhijit Guha of India. (Twitter account of Griffiths)
United Nations Special Envoy to Yemen Martin Griffiths beside Lieutenant General Abhijit Guha of India. (Twitter account of Griffiths)
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Lieutenant General Abhijit Guha Commences Mission as Head of UNMHA

United Nations Special Envoy to Yemen Martin Griffiths beside Lieutenant General Abhijit Guha of India. (Twitter account of Griffiths)
United Nations Special Envoy to Yemen Martin Griffiths beside Lieutenant General Abhijit Guha of India. (Twitter account of Griffiths)

Lieutenant General Abhijit Guha of India has commenced his mission as head of United Nations Mission to Support the Hodeidah Agreement (UNMHA), announced United Nations Special Envoy to Yemen Martin Griffiths.

He will succeed Lieutenant General Michael Lollesgaard, amid the shrinking possibility of implementing the Stockholm Agreement that goes 10 months back between the legitimate government and the Iranian-supported Houthi group.

Griffiths tweeted welcoming the Lieutenant General, saying that he looks forward to cooperating with him.

Guha is the third head of UNMHA since Stockholm Agreement, signed in December.

Redeployment Coordination Committee (RCC) for Yemen managed to let the two parties meet in six rounds of talks for the sake of implementing the agreement. However, it achieved no breakthrough except for the fragile truce that concurred with thousands of breaches.

The UN announced, last month, appointing Guha after the conclusion of Lollesgaard's term. There are hopes that he succeeds in resuming the agreement’s implementation, fixing the ceasefire, completing the second phase of redeployment, and achieving a breakthrough in the most complex issues such as security, resources, and local authority.

Despite Houthis' claims that they finished more than 90 percent of their obligations related to the Hodeidah agreement, the legitimate government affirmed that the withdrawal of the group from three ports of Hodeidah was fictitious.

The local authority, local security forces, and the ports’ resources are the main three topics hindering any tangible progress to implement Hodeidah agreement.

Yemeni Foreign Minister Mohammad al-Hadrami stressed earlier the government’s keenness to achieve peace based on the three references – he also affirmed to Griffiths in their most recent meeting that moving to political consultations regarding the comprehensive settlement with Houthis is hinged to the implementation of the Stockholm Agreement.

Hadrami called on the international community to pressure Houthis to implement it, saying that the government doesn’t expect those who didn’t respect earlier agreements to abide by the coming ones.



Blaze at Cairo Telecom Building Kills 4 and Disrupts Internet, Phone

A boy wearing a mask looks on, as firefighters work to extinguish a fire that erupted in a telecommunications building in the Ramses district of downtown Cairo, Egypt July 7, 2025. REUTERS/Amr Abdallah Dalsh
A boy wearing a mask looks on, as firefighters work to extinguish a fire that erupted in a telecommunications building in the Ramses district of downtown Cairo, Egypt July 7, 2025. REUTERS/Amr Abdallah Dalsh
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Blaze at Cairo Telecom Building Kills 4 and Disrupts Internet, Phone

A boy wearing a mask looks on, as firefighters work to extinguish a fire that erupted in a telecommunications building in the Ramses district of downtown Cairo, Egypt July 7, 2025. REUTERS/Amr Abdallah Dalsh
A boy wearing a mask looks on, as firefighters work to extinguish a fire that erupted in a telecommunications building in the Ramses district of downtown Cairo, Egypt July 7, 2025. REUTERS/Amr Abdallah Dalsh

Four workers were killed and at least 22 others were injured in a fire that broke out on Monday at a key data center in Cairo, Hossam Abdel Ghaffar, the spokesperson at Egypt's Health Ministry, told Reuters on Tuesday.

The blaze at a Telecom Egypt facility, which state TV said was contained on Monday, caused disruptions to communications across the capital.

Egypt's Minister of Communications and Information Technology, Amr Talaat, said in a statement on Tuesday that services will be gradually restored within 24 hours.

In a statement on Tuesday, Telecom Egypt said it mourned the employees that lost their lives and offered support for their families.

The fire halted phone calls, and disrupted internet access, with internet monitoring group Netblocks saying network data showed national connectivity at 62% of ordinary levels.

The health ministry posted alternative numbers for ambulance services across different governorates in case people were unable to reach its main hotline.

Besides phone calls, some digital banking services were also impacted including credit cards, ATM machines and online transactions, a bank source and residents said on Monday. Banks had already been closed for the day.

The injuries were mostly because of smoke inhalation, health ministry spokesperson Ghaffar said on Monday.

The state news agency MENA said on Monday the fire had been prevented from spreading to the entire building and neighboring rooftops.

An initial examination indicated that the fire was likely to have been caused by an electrical short circuit, MENA cited a security source as saying.