Yemen’s Hadi rejects UN peace plan amid deadly raids

ADEN

REU Photo

Yemeni President Abedrabbo Mansour Hadi on Oct. 29 rejected a U.N. peace proposal for his war-battered country, as air strikes by his Saudi-led coalition allies killed at least 60 rebels, inmates, and civilians. 

The latest peace proposal submitted by U.N. envoy Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed was rejected by Hadi who even refused to receive it as he met the mediator in Riyadh, AFP reported.

The contents of the roadmap which the envoy already presented to the rebels on Oct. 25 have not been made public.

But informed sources say it calls for agreement on naming a new vice president after the rebels withdraw from Sanaa and other cities and hand over heavy weapons to a third party.

Hadi would then transfer power to the vice president who would appoint a new prime minister to form a government in which the north and south of Yemen would have equal representation.

A statement on the government’s sabanew.net quoted Hadi as saying the roadmap “only opens a door towards more suffering and war and is not a map for peace.” 

It cited Hadi as saying the plan “rewards the putschists while punishing the Yemeni people and legitimacy.” 
Forces loyal to Hadi’s government have been locked since 2014 in deadly battles with Iran-backed Shiite Houthi rebels who overran the capital Sanaa late that year.

The conflict escalated in March 2015 when Saudi Arabia launched a military campaign to push back the rebels.

The war has left nearly 7,000 people dead, mostly civilians, according to the United Nations which had been struggling to convince the warring parties to implement a ceasefire and revive a stalled political process.

While the government has shifted its temporary headquarters to second-city Aden, Hadi resides in Riyadh with most senior officials.

It was unclear how Hadi’s Arab backers would react to his refusal, especially after a key coalition member, the United Arab Emirates, hailed the proposal on Oct. 27 as a “political solution for the Yemeni crisis.”

Saudi Arabia has not commented on the U.N. envoy’s latest proposal and the rebels have yet to respond.

Saudi-led raid kills 60 at Yemen security site, prison, says official

Meanwhile, Arab coalition warplanes bombed a security complex near the Yemeni port city of Hodeidah, killing 60 people including inmates of a prison on the site, a regional official, relatives and medical sources said on Oct. 30, according to Reuters.

The prison in the city’s al-Zaydiyah district was holding 84 inmates when it was struck three times late on Oct. 29, Hashem al-Azizi, deputy governor of the Houthi rebel-controlled Hodeidah province of the same name, told Reuters.

Local officials said the site lies within a security complex for the area guarded by Houthi militiamen but that only prison security guards were present during the night-time air strike.

A Reuters witness at the security complex said the entire building was destroyed and medics pulled about 17 bodies away - many of them missing limbs - while others remained stuck under the rubble.

One of the strikes directly targeted the building, the witness added, bringing it down over the heads of the prisoners, while two others hit the gate of the complex and nearby administration buildings.