UfM Secretary-General to Asharq Al-Awsat: Regional Cooperation Is Now Inevitable

 Union for the Mediterranean (UfM) Secretary-General Nasser Kamel. (Asharq Al-Awsat)
Union for the Mediterranean (UfM) Secretary-General Nasser Kamel. (Asharq Al-Awsat)
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UfM Secretary-General to Asharq Al-Awsat: Regional Cooperation Is Now Inevitable

 Union for the Mediterranean (UfM) Secretary-General Nasser Kamel. (Asharq Al-Awsat)
Union for the Mediterranean (UfM) Secretary-General Nasser Kamel. (Asharq Al-Awsat)

Foreign ministers of the Union for the Mediterranean (UfM) countries are meeting in Barcelona this Thursday to discuss ways of strengthening Euro-Mediterranean cooperation and facing the climate challenges that threaten economic development in the region.

In an interview with Asharq Al-Awsat on the eve of the conference, UfM Secretary-General Ambassador Nasser Kamel said the Euro-Mediterranean region, with its 43 states did not have an option but to become a cooperative and integrated bloc if it wanted to have its voice heard in tomorrow’s world.

“The geostrategic situation and the relative stability of the region had given way to further strengthening regional cooperation in all matters relating to sustainable development in the Mediterranean basin,” he noted.

“Tomorrow (Thursday), we need to review the Union’s activities in our six areas of interest, including climate change, new and renewable energy, business and trade, scientific research and education, social affairs, specifically women’s and youth empowerment, infrastructure and urban development, and environment and water,” Kamel underlined.

He explained that the evaluation of the Union’s activities would be based on the road map adopted by the UfM foreign ministers in 2017, noting that the participants would also set the necessary directives to give a new impetus to the Euro-Mediterranean cooperation 25 years after the announcement of the Barcelona Declaration.

Asked about cooperation between North and South Mediterranean countries, given the economic disparities and various political challenges, Kamel said: “This cooperation is not only a political will, I think it is an urgent necessity. The past ten years have unquestionably confirmed that what happens in one of the two shores of the Mediterranean adversely or negatively affects the opposite bank.”

He went on to say that the effects of the so-called “Arab Spring” had real repercussions on EU countries, mainly the emigration crisis and its resulting tension.

“The Euro-Mediterranean region, with its 43 countries… can only become a cooperative and integrated bloc if it is to have a voice in tomorrow’s world, where economic powers such as China and India are rising alongside the American economic giant. Thus, regional integration is not an option; it is now inevitable, so our voice can be heard in the international economic scene,” Kamel emphasized.

On whether the UfM foreign ministers meeting would adopt a plan of action to reverse the effects of climate change, in light with the recent report on climate change in the region, he said: “The Union for the Mediterranean is a regional window for the implementation of the sustainable development goals set by the international community through the United Nations. One of the priorities of these goals is to deal with climate change.”

He noted that a network of more than 80 scientists from across the Euro-Mediterranean region (Medecc) undertook a major and unprecedented report to serve as the largest scientific assessment of regional climate and environmental change in the Mediterranean region.

The study concluded that the Mediterranean region was the second most affected by climate change, after Antarctica, he warned.

He stressed that the potential repercussions of climate change led the UfM to address the issue from a holistic perspective and saw it as an opportunity to promote economic and commercial cooperation and integration “based on a blue economy that is capable of dealing with the inevitable negative impacts of climate change on one hand, and creating jobs and economic growth associated with sustainable and environmentally-friendly development on the other.”

Kamel underlined several initiatives launched by Mediterranean countries to protect the environment, including the experiences of Egypt and Morocco in the field of new and renewable energy.

“The two countries have decided to invest for years in solar energy, where they have developed one of the largest solar power plants in the world. The same applies to wind power in a number of countries, such as Jordan and Tunisia,” he remarked.

The UfM secretary-general also touched on economic cooperation between Mediterranean countries, saying that it had improved relatively over the past three years.

“Although there are some hotbeds of tension in the Mediterranean basin, the degree of political stability has increased, along with the economic growth rates in the southern Mediterranean countries, which reached about 3 percent in some countries and exceeded 5 and 6 percent in both Egypt and Morocco,” he stated, adding: “But the challenge we have not yet achieved is to create a comprehensive Euro-Mediterranean free trade area. The reasons, of course, are known: the absence of a just settlement of the Palestinian issue.”

On the emigration file, Kamel emphasized that the crisis reached its climax in 2013, 2014 and 2015.

“What we are witnessing today is by no means comparable to previous flows. This is due to the relative improvement in the political and economic conditions of the countries of the region and the more effective policies of controlling illegal immigration in the countries of the North and South,” he affirmed.



Yemeni Minister to Asharq Al-Awsat: Houthis Have Lost Nearly 30% of their Military Capabilities

This handout photo released by the US Defense Visual Information Distribution Service (DVIDS) shows a US F/A-18 Super Hornet attack fighter jet taking off from the US Navy's Nimitz-class USS Harry S. Truman aircraft carrier at sea on March 16, 2025. (Photo by Hunter DAY / DVIDS / AFP)
This handout photo released by the US Defense Visual Information Distribution Service (DVIDS) shows a US F/A-18 Super Hornet attack fighter jet taking off from the US Navy's Nimitz-class USS Harry S. Truman aircraft carrier at sea on March 16, 2025. (Photo by Hunter DAY / DVIDS / AFP)
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Yemeni Minister to Asharq Al-Awsat: Houthis Have Lost Nearly 30% of their Military Capabilities

This handout photo released by the US Defense Visual Information Distribution Service (DVIDS) shows a US F/A-18 Super Hornet attack fighter jet taking off from the US Navy's Nimitz-class USS Harry S. Truman aircraft carrier at sea on March 16, 2025. (Photo by Hunter DAY / DVIDS / AFP)
This handout photo released by the US Defense Visual Information Distribution Service (DVIDS) shows a US F/A-18 Super Hornet attack fighter jet taking off from the US Navy's Nimitz-class USS Harry S. Truman aircraft carrier at sea on March 16, 2025. (Photo by Hunter DAY / DVIDS / AFP)

The Iran-backed Houthis are in disarray over escalating American strikes targeting military and security sites, as well as weapons depots belonging to them, Yemeni Minister of Information Moammar Al-Eryani said, revealing that the group has lost nearly 30% of its military capabilities.

Al-Eryani told Asharq Al-Awsat that the recent strikes have directly hit "the military capabilities of the Houthi group, targeting mainly infrastructure related to ballistic missiles and drones, which were used to threaten international maritime navigation in the Red Sea, Bab el-Mandeb, and the Gulf of Aden."

US President Donald Trump had ordered the start of the military campaign against the Houthis on March 15, pledging to destroy their capabilities.

In the past four weeks, the Houthis have been hit by 365 air and naval strikes, field reports said. The campaign has been primarily targeting fortified bunkers and military warehouses, especially in the group's strongholds in the governorates of Saada, Sanaa, Amran, and Hodeidah.

"Our assessment, based on our field sources, is that the militia has lost 30% of its capabilities, and this number is rising as military operations continue,” Al-Eryani said.

The minister also spoke of "surprises” that will please Yemenis in the coming weeks.

Trump said Monday that the US campaign against the Houthis has been “very successful militarily.”

“We’ve really damaged them,” he said, adding that “we’ve gotten many of their leaders and their experts.”

The Yemeni Minister of Information considered the powerful strikes “as not enough to end the Houthi threat, especially since the militia is still receiving logistical support from Iran through multiple smuggling routes."

Last week, Britain’s The Telegraph quoted a senior Iranian official as saying that Iran had ordered military personnel to leave Yemen to avoid direct confrontation with the US.

Al-Eryani called for “keeping military, political, and economic pressure” on the Houthis and increasing control on the sources that provide arms to the Houthis. He also called for “supporting the legitimate forces to enable them to take control of all Yemeni territory."
Al-Eryani confirmed that the Houthis have recently suffered significant human losses at various leadership levels, yet the militias have avoided announcing such losses for fear of undermining the morale of their fighters.

Last month, Yemeni Defense Minister Lt. Gen. Mohsen Mohammed al-Daeri told Asharq Al-Awsat that the country’s armed forces and all military formations were at a high state of readiness to respond firmly to any Houthi attacks or provocations.

Al-Daeri said the Houthis bear full responsibility for the recent escalation, the imposition of international sanctions, and the militarization of regional waters, which have worsened the humanitarian and economic situation for Yemenis.