Al-Alimi Calls for Saving Yemen from Iran’s Agenda

Yemen’s Chairman of the Presidential Leadership Council (PLC) Rashad al-Alimi meets Arab League Secretary-General Ahmed Abu Al-Gheit (Saba News Agency)
Yemen’s Chairman of the Presidential Leadership Council (PLC) Rashad al-Alimi meets Arab League Secretary-General Ahmed Abu Al-Gheit (Saba News Agency)
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Al-Alimi Calls for Saving Yemen from Iran’s Agenda

Yemen’s Chairman of the Presidential Leadership Council (PLC) Rashad al-Alimi meets Arab League Secretary-General Ahmed Abu Al-Gheit (Saba News Agency)
Yemen’s Chairman of the Presidential Leadership Council (PLC) Rashad al-Alimi meets Arab League Secretary-General Ahmed Abu Al-Gheit (Saba News Agency)

Yemen’s Chairman of the Presidential Leadership Council (PLC) Rashad al-Alimi has called for backing his country in restoring state institutions and ending the Houthi-led insurgency.

Al-Alimi arrived with five PLC members in Cairo. The Yemeni leader is currently on a regional tour that saw him visiting Kuwait and Bahrain.

In Egypt, al-Alimi held talks with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi and visited the Egyptian parliament, before attending an Arab League session on Sunday.

During a speech at the Arab League, the PLC Chairman expressed his confidence in “the leading role of the League in advocating and supporting the Yemeni people in coordination with the Arab Coalition, led by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC).”

According to al-Alimi, the Arab Coalition had helped in preventing the collapse of the Yemeni state and had bolstered the steadfastness of the front resisting Iranian influence in Yemen and the region.

Al-Alimi stressed the importance of the role of regional organizations and bodies, particularly the Arab League and the GCC. He said that Yemen relies on them in making peace and defending the interests of peoples, along with the UN and the international community.

He said he hoped the mounting pressures on the Iran-backed Houthis would force them to fulfill their obligations under the UN-brokered truce agreement, including opening roads to Taiz and other cities, rescuing the Safer oil tanker to prevent an unaffordable environmental disaster in the Red Sea, releasing prisoners and detainees, and paying salaries of employees in militia-controlled areas.

Al-Alimi renewed his warning of the dangers imposed by “the Iranian regime's backing of the rogue Houthi group.”

He said that Tehran’s support for Houthis threatens the security of the region and international shipping lanes.

“The continuation of the cross-borders attacks constitutes the most dangerous threat to global energy supplies from the neighboring countries that have been very keen on maintaining Yemen’s security, stability, and ending its peoples’ suffering,” al-Alimi said, in reference to Houthi attacks on Saudi Arabia and the UAE.

He also commended the Arab League’s decision to list the Houthis as a terrorist organization and urged Arab countries to enforce this decision into effect immediately to deter the militia from committing further violations against the Yemeni people.

During his visit to Cairo, the Yemeni president also met with Arab League Secretary-General Ahmed Abu Al-Gheit, where they discussed the latest development in the war-torn country.



Blinken Says Syria's HTS Should Learn from Taliban Isolation

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken delivers a statement to the press after the meeting with the foreign ministers of the Arab Contact Group on Syria in Jordan's southern city of Aqaba on December 14, 2024. (Photo by ANDREW CABALLERO-REYNOLDS / AFP)
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken delivers a statement to the press after the meeting with the foreign ministers of the Arab Contact Group on Syria in Jordan's southern city of Aqaba on December 14, 2024. (Photo by ANDREW CABALLERO-REYNOLDS / AFP)
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Blinken Says Syria's HTS Should Learn from Taliban Isolation

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken delivers a statement to the press after the meeting with the foreign ministers of the Arab Contact Group on Syria in Jordan's southern city of Aqaba on December 14, 2024. (Photo by ANDREW CABALLERO-REYNOLDS / AFP)
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken delivers a statement to the press after the meeting with the foreign ministers of the Arab Contact Group on Syria in Jordan's southern city of Aqaba on December 14, 2024. (Photo by ANDREW CABALLERO-REYNOLDS / AFP)

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken called Wednesday on Syria's triumphant HTS opposition group to follow through on promises of inclusion, saying it can learn a lesson from the isolation of Afghanistan's Taliban.
The movement supported by Türkiye has promised to protect minorities since its lightning offensive toppled strongman Bashar al-Assad this month following years of stalemate, AFP reported.
"The Taliban projected a more moderate face, or at least tried to, in taking over Afghanistan, and then its true colors came out. The result is it remains terribly isolated around the world," Blinken said at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York.
After some initial overtures to the West, the Taliban reimposed strict restrictions including barring women and girls from secondary school and university.
"So if you're the emerging group in Syria," Blinken said, "if you don't want that isolation, then there's certain things that you have to do in moving the country forward."
Blinken called for a "non-sectarian" Syrian government that protects minorities and addresses security concerns, including keeping the fight against the ISIS group and removing lingering chemical weapons stockpiles.
Blinken said that HTS can also learn lessons from Assad on the need to reach a political settlement with other groups.
"Assad's utter refusal to engage in any kind of political process is one of the things that sealed his downfall," Blinken said.