US and UK seek Yemen cease-fire as relations with Saudis cool

WASHINGTON, 01 Nov. - (ANA) — The United States and the United kingdom (UK), Saudi Arabia’s biggest arms suppliers, are stepping up their pressure for a cease-fire in the Yemen war, the world’s worst man-made humanitarian disaster.

The calls for a halt to the conflict — by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Tuesday night, his British counterpart, Jeremy Hunt, on Wednesday, and Defense Secretary Jim Mattis starting last weekend — came as criticism of Saudi Arabia has surged over its bombing campaign in Yemen and the killing of Jamal Khashoggi, a dissident Saudi writer.

The Saudi-led bombings have been a major cause of civilian deaths and destruction during the three-and-a-half-year-old conflict in Yemen, the Arab world’s poorest country.

“It is time to end this conflict, replace conflict with compromise, and allow the Yemeni people to heal through peace and reconstruction,” Mr. Pompeo said in a statement posted on the State Department website Tuesday night.

Mr. Pompeo emphasized that the Houthi rebels in Yemen, who are fighting the Saudi-led coalition, must first stop firing missiles at Saudi Arabia and its chief ally, the United Arab Emirates. But he also said that “subsequently, coalition airstrikes must cease in all populated areas in Yemen.”

While the United States has urged talks before, Mr. Pompeo’s statement was the strongest call yet by Saudi Arabia’s American ally to stop the fighting in Yemen, where previous attempts at cease-fires have always collapsed.

The push comes as relations between Saudi Arabia and the United States have cooled in the month since Mr. Khashoggi, a Washington Post columnist, was killed in Saudi Arabia’s Istanbul consulate by a team of Saudi operatives. The operatives had close ties to Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, Saudi Arabia’s de facto ruler, architect of the Yemen war and a key Trump administration ally in isolating Iran.

On Wednesday, in Turkey’s first official account of what happened to Mr. Khashoggi inside the consulate, the Istanbul chief prosecutor said he had been immediately strangled and his body dismembered and destroyed.

Already troubled by the Yemen war and outraged over Mr. Khashoggi’s killing, Republicans and Democrats in Congress have been calling on the Trump administration to penalize Saudi Arabia. On Wednesday, five Republican senators asked President Trump to cut off civilian nuclear talks with the Saudis in a letter reported by NBC News.  - (ANA) -

AB/ANA/ 01 November 2018 - - -