New UN envoy to Yemen must confront the Houthis

The envoy had earlier met with President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi and other senior members of the government. According to Griffiths, the meetings were productive and “all agreed it is necessary to act urgently to address the crisis in Yemen.”
While the internationally recognized government of Yemen has been forthcoming and cooperated with the new envoy, the Houthis are yet to indicate their willingness to engage with the UN on the search for a political solution. Over the weekend, their leader Abdel Malek Al-Houthi sounded rather bellicose. He lambasted the UN, deriding its peace-making efforts, and attacked Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and the US. He also accused Yemen’s religious minorities of working for Israel.
Confirming his Iranian credentials, the Houthi leader also tried to draw regional actors into the fray in Yemen. He claimed that Israel was bombing Yemen and vowed to fight alongside Hezbollah in the future.
The Houthis have imposed an Iranian-style delusional approach to governance based on the “inevitability” of their victory. They believe in a divine right to rule over Yemen, by force if necessary. They try to the use the same triumphalist rhetoric and messianic zeal that worked in the early years of the Iranian revolution. 
The Houthis look at UN talks as a public relations exercise, which they try to manipulate to their advantage with no intention of implementing any agreement. To maintain deniability and reserving the right to annul any agreement, they have delegated handling UN talks to low-ranking officials who have no mandate to make any meaningful deal. That tactic was used following the successful talks held in Kuwait in 2016, and other rounds when the UN was able to narrow the differences between the parties.
Borrowing from well-worn Iranian tactics, the Houthis intend to drag the UN and all their adversaries into drawn-out, long-term talks that lead nowhere, but buy them time to smuggle in more weapons and funding from their Iranian backers. They will try to use the humanitarian crisis to weaken the resolve of Yemeni civilians under their control and sow divisions within the international community.

Borrowing from well-worn Iranian tactics, the rebels intend to drag the UN and all their adversaries into drawn-out talks that lead nowhere, but buy them time to smuggle in more weapons and funding from their backers.

Abdel Aziz Aluwaisheg

In his final briefing to the UN Security Council, previous Special Envoy Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed made it clear that the Houthis were the party responsible for the failure of UN mediation. He explained in detail how they frustrated his efforts time and again, but it was regrettable he waited until the last minute to disclose those facts. Let us hope that Griffiths does not repeat that mistake and is more transparent about the talks.
Griffiths arrives at a moment that is very conducive to making a deal. Yemeni body politic and the international community have never been so united in their views on the shape of a political settlement. Since the Houthis assassinated their former ally Ali Abdullah Saleh and attempted to dismantle Yemen’s largest political party, they have become deprived of the veneer of political mainstream they enjoyed when Saleh was alive and his party an ally of the Houthis.
The international community is also more united than before. The UN Security Council’s permanent and transient members now see the Houthis’ power grab for what it is, and most realize the malign roles that Iran and its proxies play in prolonging the conflict in Yemen. They also recognize the danger Houthis present to regional stability and international freedom of navigation. 
Griffiths comes with an impressive resume, with decades of experience in international mediation. He possesses the tools necessary to break the deadlock. To improve his chances of succeeding, he plans to build on the achievements of his predecessors but also to avoid their mistakes. He plans to re-anchor his mission on the firm pillars of international law and the global, regional and national consensus expressed in Resolution 2216, the GCC Initiative, and the outcomes of Yemen’s National Dialogue Conference — three documents that have laid very clear and quite detailed foundations for the future of Yemen. 
The Houthis should not be under any illusion that they are legally or morally equivalent to the overwhelmingly elected and internationally recognized government. State sovereignty constitutes the bedrock of international law, based on which the Houthis, who have dislodged that legitimate government, have to retreat and leave the capital and other cities. Also, according to international law, the Yemeni state should have a monopoly over the use of force and armed militias should lay down their weapons. Together with the three previously mentioned documents, these two principles should underpin any agreement.
Griffiths should also insist that there is only one mediation, led by the UN and its special envoy. All others should work through that channel. In the past, there were too many cooks who had their hands in that mediation, bypassing and undermining the special envoy and giving the Houthis the delusion that they could outsmart the UN mediation process.
The new envoy should also be closely involved in the humanitarian efforts and those of recovery and reconstruction to give Yemenis hope for the future, if they opted for peace.
Finally, the UN should comment directly on the Houthi narrative, which tries to replace, by the use of force, Yemen’s representative and egalitarian system with a theologically-based caste system that Yemenis have repeatedly rejected in the past.
• Abdel Aziz Aluwaisheg is a columnist for Arab News. Email: aluwaisheg@gmail.comTwitter: @abuhamad1