 Good morning everyone. Welcome. I'm Fred Wary. I'm a senior fellow at the Middle East program here at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. It's my pleasure to welcome you to this panel on Yemen's catastrophe, what can be done to stop the war. Those of you who follow Yemen may have attended an event that we held roughly one year ago entitled the Yemen War. Is there an end in sight? Of course the answer to that question has been a tragic no. The conflict in the Arab world's poorest country has entered its third year and shows no sign of abating. The suffering inflicted by this war has become even more catastrophic with the United Nations calling it the world's worst humanitarian crisis and the horrific details of that war I think are well known to all of us. Meanwhile the local and regional complexities of the conflict I think have multiplied further confounding a resolution whether it's the spread of AQAP, the fracturing of the Salah Houthi Alliance, the Emirati Saudi rift with Qatar which is reverberating across the region and our panel today will take stock of these emerging developments among local and regional players with a view toward understanding what can be done to end the conflict, restore governance services and relief. It's a tall order but because the US itself is party to the conflict as well we want to consider the impact of US policies and when our last panel convened this was before the presidential elections so I've asked our panelists to assess what has or has not changed under the new administration toward Yemen. I'm delighted to briefly introduce our panelists. They need no introduction to most of you. Farah al-Muslimi is a non-resident fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, the Middle East program with a wealth of insight and first-hand expertise into the country of his birth. He's just returned from a trip to Yemen and if you've not seen it I would recommend the video interview of that visit on Carnegie's Dewan blog site. Also joining us is Nadwal Dussery, another top analyst from Yemen with particular expertise in the country's tribes and civil society. A non-resident senior fellow at the project our Middle East democracy she's written a lot on the spread of AQAP and also local and regional peace initiatives. Finally I'm delighted to welcome Ambassador Gerald Feierstein currently the director for Gulf affairs and government relations at the Middle East Institute who of course served as the US Ambassador to Yemen during a really pivotal time 2010 to 2013 and then was closely involved in the country as the principal deputy assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern affairs. I think we've worked out a pretty good division of labor among our speakers we've worked out a good order I think to focusing first on regional developments sort of an on-the-ground perspective on Yemen then the role of tribes and AQAP and finally shifting back to the impact of the international community the regional actors and the US vast each of our speakers to speak for 10 minutes to be both analytical but prescriptive certainly not an easy task. Farah we'll start out with with you with some perhaps some insights from your your recent trip I was struck by something you said in our last panel that short wars change regimes long wars change societies and so what's happening you know on the ground based on your visit. Sure good morning and thank you very much and thanks everyone I mean it's good to have a stop by at Carnegie almost here now we do it last time with Ambassador Boudin but yeah I mean I'm happy to share some thoughts from my trip into Yemen but I must warn you if you're looking for something smart or optimistic you might have to wait to the next two speakers I actually was not was entered long time ago and I never had the chance to look at satellite image so my my knowledge of Yemen is very is very limited compared to the speakers around and so is there an end in what can be done a lot I think but is you know am I optimistic of course no Yemen I traveled around and this was no more the country I know or this was no more the country I grew up and this is the one thing difference in Yemen right now is this is a mass the scale war that we have never seen in our lives we have had always some sort of conflict some sort of violence some sort of something but never this wide scale or never this huge that's because yes when there is some areas where there is no war but there is a more of an economic destruction that had left most harm specifically on the nap on the north more than the war itself specifically the case of no salaries for nine months specifically the economy say the economy see internally and externally has left more or less a shattered country a country where there is no money you can make or there is no job you can make except if you are in a front lines fighting as that's right now the last big job in Yemen speaking on more details there are right now at least three months emerging in Yemen right now there is one in Sana'a that's the Houthi Saleh under the control of the Houthi Saleh and that basically have their own customs their own borders their own military their own system and that's one part of the country and then there is second Yemen or the second station of power or center of power and that's Aden and it's not really under anyone's control theoretically it's under the control of the legitimate government but it has a long dispute between the southern Iraq the president forces and some different the fractions of armed groups that developed after the war and the third the station in Yemen or the third Yemen that's right now there emerging is in Marib which is basically a combination of Islamists the combination of the National Army and the combination of basically every northerner who's not with the Houthis is basically. Marib in a lot of ways right now is the last geography that represents the Republic of Yemen where you can be there despite where you are from around the country that being said these three stations of powers barely talk to each other anymore or barely have some sort of something combined them specifically since the removal of the central bank which was an unthoughtful decision that ended up cutting the last line that really keeping this place together. Important I think from the US point of view the result can be done in that sense and that's basically because the US is a direct active in this war or a direct actor in this war but beyond that the US have something that no one else can do or can change and I think that's a seat at the UN Security Council that would allow it ability to do a new resolution that basically would commit to peace in Yemen. 2216 may be made sense by that time but it's a resolution that commits into war that's not a resolution commits into peace. That would be one thing that the United States gonna start doing let alone that the legacy of an accountability that has a thrift in Yemen and the US has been part of it. We hear a lot of complaints very legitimately against the funeral bombings the weddings bombings in Yemen which has been a common phenomena but as a matter of fact this is a legacy the Saudis are only reading from America's playbook in the past the United States have bombed funerals in Yemen in the past the United States have bombed weddings in Yemen and the Saudis came after them and actually in fact even Al Qaeda has bombed weddings in Yemen in the past and seen those. So that legacy of an accountability that legacy of destruction can be stopped and that's something I think that that we can do from Washington DC in in the way it goes. Now depending on which side you take in Yemen if you are a Houthi you will say the war started in March 25th 2015 if you are someone with the other side you will say the war started in September 21st but I think if you're someone with a brain you would have a different timeline. That will go back along to 2011 where we had something very problematic led to this war in Yemen and that was the unconditional immunity that was brought by the international community and that was brought by the Gulf in Yemen. This was a dangerous act because it set the ground for doing whatever you want and it set the ground for unaccountability in a country like Yemen where everyone has a gun and that's a very dangerous trend to start in the country. By that time however the Gulf was part of the solution in Yemen. Right now it's part of the problem and that is a very probably the most unfortunate thing happening right now between Yemen and the Gulf. In 2011 and probably Ambassador for Stine can speak more about this but the Gulf was an honorary sponsor of the GCCB and it was able to have that ownership because it wasn't part of the problem. Right now it's a big part of the problem and that's what you lose when you decide to go into a war. You decide to become part of the problem even if you didn't have to and that's the big thing we're really losing and I will end with this thought right now beyond the three centers in Yemen, beyond the regional dynamics, beyond the regional fights happening in Yemen, there is a moment of a fracture. Everything is being fractured specifically two years after the war. This honeymoon is over. It's over first between the Gulf themselves who were in Yemen for completely different reasons. We have seen this very clear so far on the Qatar crisis with the Gulf sideline in one country but we will see soon also between Saudi and UAE. It's a matter of time. They will also ultimately have to struggle for and they are already do not officially have to struggle for some space and we see it also within the Yemeni sites so the honeymoon between the president and the southern movement is over, between the Islamists and their allies is over and most recently between Saleh and the Houthis is over and that's the last dynamic happening right now in the ground. So it's a moment of a fracture, a moment of fragmentation and the moment where everyone is part of the problem unfortunately whether it be the Gulf or the United States of Africa. I'll come back if you want later on. Great. So Nadwa, if you could kind of take that view and drill down on to the role of tribes and AQA. I'm going to second everything that Tara has said. I'm one of the big believers that if the GCC has not been signed in the first place, we wouldn't have ended. So GCC was problematic and I'm sorry I'm not going to bring any less oblique picture of Yemen than you did Farah. I'm also not very optimistic. I'm going to talk about tribes and AQAP and it's such a complex topic. I'm going to talk just about the dynamics of the relationships and how relationship between tribes and AQAP and how it works just to help you understand why tribes, how tribes interact with the militant group and how they respond to threats in different ways. So before I dig into the issue of tribes and AQAP, I want to first of all highlight a few things about the tribes just to help understand how the tribes function. The tribes are not solid units with command and control. Tribal leaders have some influence on tribesmen on their tribes but they cannot force their tribes or tribesmen to make certain choices. Tribes are governed by customary law. Their main means for resolving conflicts is negotiations rather than force and the ultimate goal of customary law is to preserve social cohesion and achieve long-term reconciliation beyond violent conflicts. Tribes normally avoid the use of force unless they've exhausted every other means for peacefully resolve a situation. They'll come to compromises to prevent their areas from becoming a zone for violent conflicts and they will generally avoid fighting in their own areas unless they're faced with immediate threat. Now tribes have varying degrees of control in Yemen but they're increasingly challenged by the political turmoil and the deterioration of the security situation and the war. Now the mainstream assumption about the tribes is that they offer safe haven for AQAP. But evidence from research indicate that AQAP strength does not stem from the Yemeni tribes or their relationship with the Yemeni tribes. AQAP spread in tribal areas for the same reasons that it spread in urban areas as well. AQAP militants manage to recruit members among tribes mainly by tapping into deep grievances and resentment against the central government and in particularly the targeted youth who have no opportunity and limited education. But while AQAP recruited tribesmen and in some instances made their way into tribes through some tribal leaders, it was never able, the militant group was never able to recruit a tribe and was never successful so far has failed to strike an alliance with any Yemeni tribe. I argue that the tribes have played a critical role in preventing AQAP from making substantial gains in Yemen. Without the tribes I think based on my research and other people as well, I think AQAP would have been much greater threat to Yemen and to the West. Without the tribes, AQAP would have been a much greater threat to the West and to Yemen. Tribes have pushed AQAP from Abyan in 2012. They pushed AQAP from Baida, from Radha, just 90 miles south of Sana'a in 2012. And even under the current war, AQAP lived major cities in South Yemen last year, not because of military offensive, but mainly because of, as a result of tribal mediation, as a result of pressure from tribes. And AQAP was able to establish control and govern in areas that are, that are of, of a weaker tribal structure. So the dynamics of the relationship, tribes are stronger than AQAP and AQAP is not strong to challenge the tribes yet. AQAP has always been careful not to challenge the tribes and to avoid confronting and has been keen to avoid confronting with them. The group believes that the biggest threat to them, not the US military, not the Yemeni military, but the Yemeni tribes, because they know if the tribes turn against them, they cannot stand a chance. Now the tribes see AQAP as a threat, but they never use the force against them. That's because the tribes fear that the use of force might, might instigate violence within the tribes, mainly between members and of tribes who are opposed to AQAP and others who are supportive. And there were clashes in the past that happened after interventions, peaceful, or by using force to push AQAP out, that led to violence within the tribes. So the tribes try to avoid that because it destabilizes the order within the tribes. They also, the tribes have never gotten enough support or commitment from the government to fight AQAP and they never were able to do it on their own. So the tribes have always implemented a strategy of containment rather than direct confrontation with AQAP. How much? Five minutes. Okay, I'll wrap up. Okay. So that, so that was all before the war. It's still the case. But in this current war, that the AQAP has gained a lot more presence among the tribes, particularly in areas where there is fighting between the Houthis and local tribes such as Baidah. The tribes who have previously been opposed to AQAP welcomed the help of the AQAP to help them out of their areas. A classic example of the enemy of my enemy rather than sympathy with AQAP. But the tribes still see AQAP as a threat, but they see Houthis as a larger threat to them, as a more pressing, greater threat to them. Tribes perceive Houthis as outside aggressors and an extension of the Imamate, which is a theocracy that ruled Yemen and exploited tribes in mid and lower Yemen, which is where the AQAP is spread, until until 2000 until 1962. Now Houthis have humiliated the tribes. They have committed atrocities against them. They abducted, arbitrarily arrested, killed and blew up the houses of their opponents, including tribal leaders. By contrast, AQAP never challenged the authority of the tribes and even protected them when they needed. For the tribes, AQAP is tomorrow's problem, but Houthis are today's existential threat that they need to deal with right now. So the longer the fighting between Houthis and local tribes last, the more influence AQAP will have. And the longer the war continues, the weaker the tribes will be. And it's only a matter of time before the last line of defense against AQAP that has been effective so far, which is the Yemen tribes breaks down. Okay, thank you. Pick it up. I'll give all the answers. Okay. First of all, thanks to you, Fred, and to the Carnegie Endowment for giving us this opportunity to talk to you today. And thanks to the audience for coming. I wanted to cover four elements of international community engagement in the Yemen conflict. One, support for a resolution to the Yemen civil war. Two, the urgent efforts to address critical humanitarian requirements. A third is the role of the Saudi-led coalition in supporting an end to the conflict, but also in the post-conflict period, which I think is extremely important. And finally, to suggest an approach to addressing the resurgence of AQAP and violent extremism, as Nadwa covered. I wanted to begin the discussion on the political situation with the word about the GCC initiative and the implementing mechanism. Many observers have argued, and Faree, I think, would agree, that the GCC initiative was flawed and that a new political process should be launched that would expand participation both demographically and regionally, therefore potentially bringing about an outcome that's more reflective of broader Yemeni preferences. In my view, many of the criticisms of the GCC initiative failed to acknowledge that the negotiators of the initiative did attempt to address all or many of these shortcomings. They did require expanded participation by women and youth in the political process and even beyond the political process in all of the structures and all of the mechanisms of the state. They insisted that there be adequate representation from the south and the north of the north. And they established a national dialogue process with the intent of addressing core challenges to Yemen that went beyond the immediate political crisis. I wouldn't argue, I wouldn't suggest that the GCC initiative was flawless. But I would say that based on my own experience as one of the people working on that process, that in my view, it was the best solution that was attainable within the context of the Yemeni reality at the time. I therefore think that it would be extremely optimistic to suggest that new effort to start from scratch and negotiate a new agreement on a political arrangement in Yemen would bring about a different or substantially better result. In fact, in my view, given the deep infractures in Yemeni society as a result of the civil conflict, I think it would be extremely unlikely to bring about any positive outcome, let alone one that would improve on what we've already got. So the question is, what does that mean for the role of the international community? And in my view, I think that concluding the political transition process under the terms of the GCC initiative, and the outcomes of the National Dialogue Conference should remain as the core objective for negotiating the resolution of the current civil conflict. In order to accomplish that, the international community should support the UN effort that's underway under the leadership of Special Envoy Ismail al-Sheikh Ahmed within the context of UNSCR 2216. The international community should continue to insist that the legitimate government of Yemen be able to return to Sana'a and reestablish its functions, including maintaining law and order in the capital. But but that also would permit negotiations on governance issues between the parties to continue once everyone is back in Sana'a. But in my view, any subsequent arrangement on changes to the governing structure should be on the basis of mutual agreement and should be time limited, lasting only long enough to complete implementation of the GCC initiative and permit formation of a new government chosen by the Yemeni people themselves. And I would point out in that regard, that the last time Yemenis have actually had the opportunity to go to the polls and choose their own government was in 2007. And people will argue whether that was a legitimate process either. You could maybe go all the way back to 2003. And therefore, that elections are long overdue. Secondly, addressing the humanitarian crisis should be in my view, as much of a priority if not even a greater priority for the international community, as is understanding the the conflict. There is on the table a proposal to allow mutually accepted third parties to assume control of the port of Hodeidah and the Sana'a International Airport, opening them for humanitarian supplies, ensuring that they're not used for smuggling arms and other contraband into the country, and managing onward distribution to communities regardless of their political affiliation, urgent repairs of the port of Hodeidah to restore its full capacity, utilizing equipment, which is already prepositioned in the region by the US, should be a part of any agreement to reopen the port. The Hadi government and the Saudi-led coalition have accepted this proposal. The Houthis have not. My understanding is that the Houthi reluctance to accept the proposal relates to the loss of the enormous financial windfall that they gained through the control of Hodeidah port. The international community should increase pressure on the Houthis to agree to this arrangement. Hodeidah serves the 75% of the Yemeni population that lives in the north. And similarly, the continued closure of Sana'a airport has imposed extremely negative effects on thousands of Yemenis. If Iran were to want to play a positive role in addressing the needs of the Yemeni people, as opposed to sustaining the conflict, this would be a golden opportunity for it to demonstrate goodwill by using its influence with the Houthis to press them to cooperate on the proposal. In addition to reopening Hodeidah and Sana'a port, the international community should press both the government and the Houthisala alliance to restore the functioning of the central bank. And this goes back to Faria's point. A key element of the humanitarian crisis in Yemen is not related to the absence of food and other essential supplies in the country. In fact, they are available. It's the absence of the means to purchase available supplies. A 25% of Yemenis depend on government payments for their income. The inability or unwillingness to continue these payments has compounded the crisis. The international community should insist that the parties cooperate in reestablishing the central bank, ensuring that it can function outside of the political conflict, and continuing to explore measures like the establishment of a trust fund that would guarantee that the central bank would have the resources that it requires in order to capitalize economic activity. The Yemeni conflict is primarily a civil war, and the decision to end the conflict is primarily in the hands of the Yemeni parties to the civil war. Nevertheless, the Yemeni people and the international community look to Saudi Arabia as coalition partners to provide assurance that they will support a reasonable political agreement to end the fighting. Based on my own experience discussing the conflict with senior Saudi officials, as well as the comments by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman that have been recently made public, I believe that Saudi Arabia would in fact welcome a conclusion to the conflict. Undoubtedly, the Yemeni conflict has imposed costs on Saudi Arabia in human and financial terms as well as in damage to its international reputation that were unanticipated at the beginning of the conflict. That said, I believe that Saudi Arabia will identify three core elements of an agreement that it can support. One, the presence of a government in Sana'a that will maintain friendly relations with Riyadh. Two, security for the Saudi Yemeni border and an intercross border violations. And third, no hostile Iranian presence in Yemen. In regard to the first requirement of a friendly government, the Saudis have been clear that they are not opposed to Houthi participation in a future Yemeni government provided that they function as a political organization and not as an or militia in the manner of his Bala. The goals and objectives of the second partner in the coalition, the UAE are less well established. The Emiratis join the coalition primarily to demonstrate support for Saudi Arabia and to underline their perception that the threat of the Yemeni conflict presented a challenge broadly to Gulf security and stability. The Emirati leadership has been clear both publicly and privately that they regret that the conflict has not been resolved yet and that they would welcome its end. Nevertheless, the deterioration of the Emirati relationship with the Hadi government, relations with southern secessionist elements and odd and rumored negotiations with members of the Ali Abdullah Saleh family about their potential future role in Yemeni governance raised questions about the UAE's continued commitment to abide by the terms of UNSCR 2216. It's important that the international community remain very clear in its discussions with members of the coalition and others that its commitment to the UN negotiations and an outcome that is consistent with the relevant agreements, the GCC initiative, the outcomes of the international dialogue conference in UNSCR 2216 is iron clad. It's also important that the international community remain clear eyed about the importance of achieving a resolution of the Yemeni conflict that is reassuring to Yemen's Gulf neighbors. Yemen's friends anticipate that Saudi Arabia and its Gulf partners will take the lead in guiding and financing essential reconstruction and development efforts in Yemen in the post conflict period. A welcoming Yemen into broader economic and social integration with its Gulf neighbors is potentially an important element of Yemen's future economic, political and social stability. It's unrealistic to expect that the Saudis and their partners would take on their anticipated role in a scenario where they perceive that the outcome of the conflict left their security and national interests under threat. A final word on the equally important issue of the effort to defeat al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, AQAP and other extremist groups. In a welcome development, the UAE in particular has committed to confront terrorist groups successfully pushing AQAP out of Makkala and now expanding the fight to Shabwa. The US has supported that effort and has also resumed its own engagement to turn back AQAP's efforts to capitalize on the political conflict in the country and regain ground at loss during the period of 2011 to 2014 that featured cooperation and coordination between the United States and the government of Yemen. But in pursuing the fight against AQAP, it's absolutely essential that care be taken to distinguish between those elements truly committed to AQAP's ideological embrace of global jihad and those Yemenis who might have turned to AQ not out of any ideological commitment but because they believe they were engaged in an existential fight with domestic opponents and saw AQAP as a source of needed arms and finance. I agree entirely with Nedwa on this point. Frankly speaking, I think for many Yemeni tribes, they don't see AQAP any differently than they see the government of Yemen or in fact any differently than they see the United States as some entity that they can use to their own advantage and their own requirements. Once the fighting has ended and the time has come to renew the focus on the fight against extremism, we will need to rebuild relations with the latter group and regain their support in the effort to eliminate AQ. If we fail to distinguish between these two groups, we run the risk of losing access to potential allies in the future, making the fight against AQAP infinitely more difficult, if not impossible. And I'll stop there. Wonderful. Well, thank you all for the comprehensive but concise presentations. We stayed well within the limit, which gives a lot of time for questions. I'm going to take the first round just a few followups. Farah, you on your trip, I think you also went to Muscat. Can you say a bit about Oman's role in this and what you felt on the ground from Oman's efforts? Yeah, I mean, Oman is one of the only Gulf country that was in part of the coalition. It has tried to this attach itself from the military operations in Yemen. And it does have a quite because of that it does have a quite a leverage over the Houthis. That to my understanding is even higher than actually the leverage of the Iranians and actually is higher than leverage of any other actor among the Houthis, because they, one, again, again, have not been bombing them, but to have a blade this side track of brokers between them and the rest of the Gulf countries, sometimes even organize the secret negotiations, sometimes organize the meeting between the Americans and the Houthis. The Omanis enjoy very much the backseat. Usually they don't like media. They don't talk to the media. They have a quite room for negotiations that goes back from the Iranian deal to the current one. And they have tried to, again, keep themselves away from this larger regional fragmentation, whether on Yemen or in Syria or in different other crisis over the region. It does not have hostile relationship with the Saudis. It can have hostile relationship with the UAE. It has a different agenda with the UAE than it has with Saudi or more different. Right now it has also a new ally inside the Gulf, which is Kuwait, you know, but Kuwait is assigned to solve the Qatar crisis, not the Yemeni crisis. One main thing is the Oman have not used, they have used their leverage over the Houthis to solve a problem between the Houthis and outsiders. They still haven't used it or used that leverage to mediate between the Houthis and other Yemenis, which is really Houthis. It's a main problem. A main problem is not with the Saudis or with the internet. There are very many problems they are facing right now is with Yemenis. And that's the biggest obstacle they are going to face in the long term, specifically because MBS and Abdul Malik and Houthi war is not because they are that much different, but rather because they couldn't be best friends yet. There is a lot of similarities that exist in that and more than any differences between the two. It is as powerful as even the perception of life and politics over all in Yemen. Great. And Nadwa, you gave us a really granular view of the tribes and their relationships. Can you just sort of, you know, operationalize this? I mean, this, this, you know, how do, how do tribes interact with outside actors and how to outside actors try to influence tribes? I mean, there's this sort of policy mystique about tribes that they can be mobilized from the outside. And how does that work in practice? And so, you know, from both the regional, but also maybe U.S. Well, the tribes are not isolated entities in Yemen and outside Yemen. Tribal leaders and tribal members have been members of tribes, members of government, I mean, members of Salih government and his opposition leaders for tribal leaders. They, the tribes were engaged in the National Dialogue Conference. They, a lot of tribesmen are in Saudi right now. So they're there. They're engaged in the process, but they haven't been, the tribes, the, the tribes have not been engaged previously by the Yemeni government in Salih and in Hadi in the war against the AQAP. The, honestly, because I think Salih and Hadi were not really committed, committed they did not have a commitment to fight AQAP. And in fact, Salih exploited AQAP for his own, used AQAP for his own purposes to eliminate his opponents and to keep money coming from, from the West. So I, I think the tribes remain the untapped potential. They're accessible. They like to talk, they like to compromise and, and they know better than anybody else in their own local context what is, what is best that can be done, not only to fight AQAP and, and, and remind the group, but also to establish security and governance in their own areas. And I think they need to be engaged at a local level, case by case. And you talked about the UAE efforts in, in Shabbat and, and I think the problem with the, with the UAE effort, although I think there might be good intentions, I think the problem is that they have excluded certain tribes. For example, in Shabbat, the Shabbat elite forces that are managed by the Emiratis, they raided tribes, they're formed of certain tribes. They, they excluded an Awalak tribe, which is the largest in Shabbat and is the tribe where AQAP is active. So I think even though these efforts are welcome in principle, I think they haven't been sensitive to the tribal context and they have been more based on a traditional security approach rather than, you know, engaging the tribes and engaging the community, which is what we need to do. Ambassador, in, in your presentation, you, you mentioned the, the I word, which gets a lot of currency around here, Iran, the role of Iran. How do you think about Iran's role? Can you say a bit more? You said if they choose not to sustain the conflict anymore, but they can play a role in, in brokering peace by pressing the Houthis. I mean, what's, what's your conception of Iran's centrality to this? Their, their actual influence on the ground? Well, there's no question, I think that Iran has been involved in the Yemeni conflict in an extremely negative way that Iran has exploited the situation inside of Iran in order, basically to threaten primarily Saudi, but more broadly Gulf security and stability, and that that was, you know, done provocatively and basically resulted. I mean, that was a key component of the Saudi decision to intervene in, in the Yemen conflict in, in March of 2015. And so, so the, the, the Iranian role, which actually goes all the way back. And one of the, one of the things that I think is important to keep in mind is that Iran began its efforts to, to provide military training and assistance to the Houthis, at least in 2012, if not prior to 2012. So, so at a period in which, in fact, there was a broad movement within Yemen to try to achieve a peaceful political transition, the Iranians were already smuggling weapons to, to the Houthis. They were already sending IRGC and Hisbollah trainers to Sa'ada. So their role, which primarily has been directed by the IRGC and the Quds Force, up until this point, has been a negative one. The question is whether there is within Iran a sense that, A, if they wanted to reduce tensions in the region, and B, if the Rouhani government were ready to challenge the IRGC and the Iran hardliners, that you could make the argument that one place that they could achieve quick success would be in Yemen. Yemen is not important for Iran. It never has been important for Iran. It is important for Saudi Arabia. And therefore, if they wanted to do something to reach out to the Saudis, that would be a good place for them to do it. And that, I think, is an idea that we, maybe not necessarily the United States, but that others, the UN or others might explore. And if I may, on that point, I think it's, yeah, it's important to realize that probably Iran's rule in Yemen is destructive, like anywhere else in the region. But there is three myths that usually goes with talking about Iran and Yemen. First, the Iranians, just like everyone else, they were surprised by the takeover of the Sana'a by the Houthis. It was a surprise to them. It was a surprise. And the Houthis would have taken Sana'a with Iran and without Iran help. And in fact, what happened also in addition to that is they took, there was even a gulf okay for the Houthis to take over Sana'a by that time two years ago. There was too many local dynamics and too many gulf internal crisis that they actually were happy with the Houthis when it comes to taking this down. I don't, you know, I think even by now the Houthis realize that their relationship with Saudi is more important than relationship with Iran. And again, they are fighting not because they are the Hezbollah in Yemen, but rather, in my opinion, because they are looking for attention from within the Saudis. I, you know, probably the Iranians gave some sort of building capacity to the Houthis, but you will never really need to teach Yemenis how to fight, let alone the Houthis, a group that has emerged on fight since, since 2004. And finally, I mean the Houthis even right now, to my knowledge, make more money on a black market and buy weapons from the government outside more than they actually get from Iran. Iran has looked at them as a very little low cost problem they can raise in Saudi's face more than really as a strategic ally. Interestingly, the Iran has dealt with Yemen exactly the same way US has dealt with Yemen. The US has offshore Yemen to Saudi and the Iranians have offshore Yemen to Hezbollah. It's almost their biggest contractor in Yemen is Hezbollah. They don't even deal with it directly, just exactly like the US and Yemen and going to Saudi. I wouldn't agree with all of that, but anyway. I'm not saying Saudi is like Hezbollah. So we are going to have lots of questions. So we'll take questions three at a time. Please introduce yourself, identify yourself and please do ask a question. So we'll start with you, sir. Well, wait for the mic if you wouldn't mind. So thank you. Oh, please. Sorry. Thank you very much. My name is Mohamed al-Hadrami. I'm the political councillor at the Yemen Embassy here in DC. Thank you very much for organizing this. And I think that the panelists for a very informative and lucid presentations, I have actually two questions with some comments in between. As you know, Yemen, it's not only affected by its surroundings, it's also affected by its internal dynamics like any other conflict. And for Farah that leads me to the question haven't been lucky enough to be in Sana'a recently. The most talk topic in Sana'a now is the friction between Salah and the Houthis. I want to hear your insights and also what are the perspectives of the residents of Sana'a of this conflict? Do you think it's the beginning at the end of this fragile conflict and how, in your opinion, it would affect the future peace talks? And for ambassadors, it's always good to see you and to hear your thoughts. You mentioned a data plan, which as you know, a military option that the government was seeking to liberate her data and to get all the profit-sharing from aid and all the abuses. The government agreed. The Houthis refused. You mentioned pressures in your presentation. So what kind of pressures do you think? How can the government, the international community, do to help will the sheikh persuade the Houthis to come back to another round peace talks? Because without this, I don't think we could get it over. And thank you very much. Hi, my name is Kate Kaiser. I'm with the Yemen Peace Project. My question is for Farah and Nadwa. I wonder if you could speak to the issue of accountability. Over the last, since 2011, really, there has not been an internationally-led investigation to abuses by all sides. And abuses by all sides continue with impunity in the conflict. And I wonder what role the international community can take and maybe use that as leverage to push for peace. Very important question. Thank you. My name is Jonathan Apikian with Partners Global. Thank you all for your very insightful remarks. I just had a quick question in particular for the Yemeni panelists, Nadwa and Farah. As we most of us know, Yemen has a very rich tradition of conflict resolution and mediation historically. And in many ways, if this war was up to Yemenis themselves to resolve, it probably would have been resolved. But it's not. There's so many outside actors. And we know and we have seen a lot of traction at the local level, especially locally local tribes, making progress and traction in the peace process at the local level, whether we talk about prisoners, swaps. You know, last year in Taiz, there was a very large prison and swap that was mediated by local tribes. Whereas Ben Omar took months and months and only released four prisoners. So my question is, what can the international community do to harness the power of local mediation that exists in Yemen to harness the historical traditions, whether it's customary law or otherwise, that exist in Yemen of conflict resolution? Because I think that's very much lacking. And if there was an opportunity to grasp and build on that, we would make much more progress in the peace process. Thank you. Why don't we start with that last question? On the local local resolution, maybe a few guys want to take that. Yeah. So I mean, you're right, that the tribes, even under the current war, I mean, in areas where they're fighting, they still continue to carry conflict resolution. There were very complex tribal conflicts that have been solved this year in Baidah and in Ma'reb that have been around for quite one is 40 years and the other one is 20 years between tribes, but they were resolved in the current war, during the current war. The tribes have taken measures in order to avoid, in order to mitigate the impact of the conflicts and the fighting on the dynamics between the tribes themselves. As you said, they have they have helped, you know, in diffusing some tensions and in prisoner swaps. I think the one thing that the international community need to do is stop being solely focused on the national process. It's important to focus on the peace process. It's important to focus on bringing the sides, the main sides of the conflict into an agreement. Although I doubt that that would happen because I don't see these sides committed to peace more than the war because they benefit from the war than peace. I think what should be done is take a localized approach. Case by case. Dyes is different than Marib is different than Bayla is different than Shabua is different than Abiyan. So from a peace perspective and from a security perspective, we need to take these case by case. We need to engage the tribes. I talked about, you know, undermining AKAP. But I think tribes need to be also engaged in terms of local reconciliation because this war, as Farah mentioned, it left it affected the communities. It affected the society. It created conflicts at a very, very local level which hasn't happened before in Yemen. And so the tribal mechanisms, the tribes can help mitigate tensions at that level so that we prevent, you know, total collapse of the society. And it's true that Yemen has not collapsed so far because it has had a strong society but that's changing and I think the tribes can mitigate that change and kind of slow down and in some cases reverse that kind of deterioration in this slight. A question to both of you, are you an accountability? Yeah, I mean, if I take a few minutes. Look, I think the investigative committee is the most clear or the biggest evidence of how serious the international community is about in Yemen, about peace, how not serious it is. This is important because and this was the biggest flaw with the GCCD. I don't have any better argument than today's better than today's unfortunate reality to say that that was problematic. It ultimately led to this war or whether we like it or not. And I think that happened because of the absence of accountability. When you have someone like Salah and you give him accountability, you give him immunity and you make it very unconditional. So you have someone who was the head of a mafia and the head of a state and certainly he's just the head of the mafia. Since 2011 they have been blocking all investigative committees internationally speaking and that has been the best thing not just to the Saudis but even to the Saudis look to the siege on Da'az. They can do it, they can continue because they're very sure that the government will actually block creating investigative committee and the international community behind it. That has been probably the most dangerous thing in Yemen and the region overall. No accountability since this war started or since 2011. And when you produce and when you introduce that legacy you should not be surprised with violence that comes after it. What I'm doing right now is basically stop blocking the creation of an international investigative committee in Geneva. It's extremely important and I think it can play a big role. On the Houthi-Saleh relationship just like on every side honeymoon is over. They basically had to be found themselves on the same side and then second day they found that they have to answer bigger questions. They have to share things, they have to parcel a few things and that's what sparked a violence between them. This is specifically true right now in Sana'a the Houthis have the money and they have security. Saleh has the politics and some of the weapons. This is the division of right now of resources among between them in the ground in Sana'a. And on specifically on local mediation and on the tribes yes it can work it can do something but the problem right now is this is not anymore a war in the hand it is about Yemen it is in Yemen but it is not in the hand of Yemen. We can end the local thing we can hold the local facilitation of tribal hair and tribal there but there has to be a large of regional and international agreement to end the war in Yemen and it's possible contrary to Libya contrary to Syria this is a solvable crisis this is a fight that everyone can end specifically but that decision has to happen and then there is so much limit to what you can do with local mediation basically end the crisis and then everyone from outside from both sides keep army weapons and money there is a limit to what you can do with that you can do a damage control you can maintain the social cohesion to a certain point but you cannot really achieve much there has to be a decision that there needs to be peace in Yemen that decision is not taken right now the UN might can know it but the UN is no more capable of solving this crisis the UN needs absolutely branding and many other things in Yemen since 2011 it was not as sensitive to a locally driven contextualized process national dialogue conference was the most expensive and biggest networking event in the history of Yemen did it do much beyond that no it brought some youth brought some women yes they participated in the process but they participated in a faulty process there was an empowerment of youth yes but they were empowerment of youth to corruption they refused to do what the elderly are doing same applies with women that whole process needs to be rebranded that's to be rethought from a local and international perspective Aster the question on who data yeah but before I do that I have to respond and fundamentally as somebody who was very much involved in the whole effort to work out the GCC initiative I think the thing that people need to keep in mind is that the Yemeni society was divided in 2011 this was not a situation where people could dictate to Ali Abdullah Saleh what the terms of the agreement were going to be the fact of the matter is I like it or not there would not have been a GCC initiative without the agreement to provide Ali Abdullah Saleh immunity now you can say that that was an unfortunate occurrence I wouldn't necessarily disagree with you I think that it would have been a good thing I think it would have been a good thing if we had been able to demand that Ali Abdullah Saleh leave Yemen and give up politics but that simply wasn't in the cards it was not realistic in 2011 to demand that and so the issue that we who were trying to promote and to arrive at an agreement on a peaceful transition were left with is that we could make accommodations and make compromises as unhappy and as unwelcome as they may have been or we could have had Syria in 2011 and if you want to argue that Syria has a happier outcome than Yemen does we can have that conversation but I think that that was the reality and I think that you have to accept and understand that that was the reality that we who were trying to work on these issues were confronted with in terms of Iran what I would say is that Ismail has gone to Iran and tried to speak to them to talk to Zarif and to see whether there is scope within the Iranian context to be more helpful more constructive in trying to to approach this I mean part of the problem that we have right now is that the international community all of the weight all of the influence that the international community has is fundamentally on one side of the equation which is the government the coalition and therefore all of the emphasis all of the focus is on the roles of the government and the coalition and all of this there is no countervailing pressure on the Houthis or Ali Abdullah Saleh to be responsive and so you know you ask whether Ismail can get people to come back to the negotiating table that's a good question and I think it would be extremely helpful if we could engage the Iranians in some way not necessarily to demand or to force a Houthi outcome or Houthi cooperation but at least to put their finger on the scales to tip it that way and to make clear to the Houthis that they would welcome an outcome I agree with Faria that the Houthis are not a wholly owned subsidiary of the government of Iran or the IRGC or even Hezbollah but I don't agree that that the Iranians don't have at least the capacity to have substantial influence on the way the Houthis think I also agree with the fact and I've always agreed and always had the conversations with our friends in Saudi Arabia that ultimately the Houthis are not stupid they understand that they are always going to share a border with Saudi Arabia they're never going to share a border with Iran that eventually their interest lies in having a relationship with Saudi Arabia and the fact of the matter is that if you go back 18 months and look at the spring of 2016 that's exactly what was happening the last time that I was in Riyadh was in April of that year and in fact at that time there was a dialogue going on between the Houthis and the Saudis there was optimism there was in fact a de facto if not de jure ceasefire on the border the Saudis were sending significant humanitarian assistance to Sadna there was a prisoner exchange between the Saudis and the Houthis and so things were moving in a very positive direction and I can say that the Saudi leadership was quite optimistic that in fact they had cracked the code on the Houthis and so the question is what happened between the spring of 2016 and now and why did the Houthis pull away from that and resume the conflict with Saudi Arabia in the effort to threaten Saudi so I think that that certainly Iranian and Hezbollah influence played a role and the other thing that I would say about the Houthis my own sense is that people kind of think about the Houthis in a monolithic sense they think that all of the Houthis follow the leadership of Abdel Malik Al-Houthi I think that they follow the leadership of Abdel Malik Al-Houthi in the same way that the Iranians were all followers of the Ayatollah Khomeini when he was still alive which is that you have many different approaches everybody says yes we're a follower of the Ayatollah but they all follow him in their own ways and I think that within the Houthi within the Houthi structure you have many different views many different factions I think that there is a peace faction among the Houthis but I also think that there is a faction within the Houthis particularly among elements who were in Sana'a that we encountered in a very negative way in 2015 that is committed to an extremely aggressive approach to continuing the war and I think that those are the elements that are closest to the Iranians closest to his Mughal I mean I agree and disagree I think the thing with the Houthis is they are very, you're right they're very different group and there is no one pack you can put them in it but I think the problem is not with the Houthis of Sana'a but rather with the Houthis of Sana'a the one who will block peace is actually the Houthis who are from Sana'a who live off devalising Sa'ada to the world and devalising the world to Sa'ada think of them as a weapon company in DC they benefit of a lot of disputes a lot of problems and this is a very problematic group within the Houthis who wants basically just like the war economy except in a different way there is so many people who are benefiting all the way from Riyadh to Sa'ada and don't want to end this war even when it is possible and I think that's what really stood in front of many possibilities is that war has established itself as an economy for everyone inside every group that it is now too expensive to too many people to end this war I agree with that I agree with that Yes, Bill Hartung Center for International Policy two things that haven't come up the Saudi bombing campaign and the civilian casualties the allegations of torture by the UAE doesn't the US have to address that maybe condition military support I'm getting to the bottom of that can those things just be put to the side? Hi, Laura Kasadoff, I'm a journalist you worked in Yemen I have a question for Ambassador Farisdine I'm curious about what's going forward and even talking about the GCC initiative going forward the things that went wrong in the past which I'm sure we all have some differing ideas some of the same ideas of the things that went wrong in the past what is going to change going forward and particularly in regards to Saleh because that obviously was a big issue in the past whether it be immunity and whether or not he would have agreed to step down obviously without the immunity but what's going to be done with him in the future and his family, particularly him and then also what's going to be done about Hadi's lack of legitimacy I guess and lack of popularity particularly in Sana'a and then I have a question for Nadwa about tribalism and the tribalism has sort of broken down in Yemen at least that's how it used to be seen throughout the years more and more as people were moving to the cities and I'm curious if you think that this current conflict has changed that or that it has continued to break down or that it has sort of strengthened the role of the tribe I'm curious and then I have a final question for Farah since he was recently in Yemen and particularly in AQAP areas about you know occasionally the media we see news about ISIS rising in Yemen or the ISIS fighting with AQAP in Yemen or something like that and so I'm curious about your take on whether or not there can whether or not there's ISIS in Yemen Thank you very much Michael Kurtzik, retired from the Department of Agriculture and I will admit at the outset I'm quite ignorant about the subject of Yemen and that's why I'm here to learn and your comments yesterday were excellent and the whole conference was excellent I'm looking from the economic side and I don't want to insult Yemen what is the attraction? Is there oil? Are there minerals there? Is there liquid natural gas? Is there sitting on an aqueduct of water the size of Mediterranean or something? What is constant fighting there? And just to go back it seems to me I remember 1975 80 Egypt was in there and there's always somebody in there from outside what do they want? Is there strictly a strategic battle between... I'll leave it at that Thank you Go back to the question on the bombing campaign, torture and conditionality on USA Well, of course the the Obama administration did pull back on a number of the different aspects of cooperation with Saudi Arabia from the time that the conflict began in March of 2015 until the end of the administration in 2017 My own view was that that was counterproductive I never agreed with it I didn't agree with it when I was in the State Department I didn't agree with it after I left the State Department for a few reasons Look, in terms of the bombing campaign and Faria made the point in a very tendentious way but not in a particularly incorrect way factually You look at the U.S. Air Force record in Afghanistan, for example you look at it in Syria or Iraq as well as unfortunately sometimes in Yemen Have we hit funerals? Yes Have we hit wedding parties? Yes Have we caused civilian casualties? Yes Did we do it on purpose? Did we do it out of recklessness? No We did it because these things are unfortunate aspects of a conflict and unfortunately they happen and I would say the same thing about Saudi Arabia People throw around this idea that war crimes have been committed I don't believe that war crimes have been committed I think that there have been unfortunate incidents the funeral party incident last year being the most dramatic aspect of that but there are other things I think always the importance in this is to investigate to understand what happened, what went wrong sometimes the funeral party incident I think that the government of Saudi Arabia did do an investigation and I think that they came back with a report and said that this was a result of bad intelligence that they were misguided or misunderstood what the nature of this gathering was and therefore they thought that they were hitting a Houthi group So I think that it's important and where we were engaged earlier on in the conflict was trying to work with the Saudis in trying to help improve all of those aspects of their performance how do you minimize the number of these kinds of incidents and I would say that if you look at the trend line there is a decline in the number of these things over these past years so I think that more engagement rather than less engagement is the key to all of this and always recommended that we were also working very carefully and closely with the Saudis on doing more to ensure that everybody who was involved in these operations understood what the laws of armed conflict were what the various international responsibilities were if you were doing these things so that in fact you could make sure that people were observing all of the relevant international law and I think that that's the right way to go forward On the issue of allegations of Emirati torture and Makala, I think it's an important issue I think that there needs to be a full investigation I think that all of the parties involved have denied it but I think that there needs to be a better understanding of what exactly happened whether there was a truth so, yeah Why don't we follow up with the question to you? Yeah, my own sense I think that the fundamental elements of the initiative were good the implementation of the initiative was mixed We, you know, after the agreement was completed the international community the ten embassies that were directly involved in this kind of divided up responsibilities of tracking the implementation of various components and the U.S. Embassy took responsibility for the military and security reorganization aspect and I would say that, you know as is obvious from what happened our success was not spectacular and it wasn't spectacular primarily because the Salas continued to interfere and continue to try to ensure that leadership of the military remained loyal to them as opposed to the loyalties of the state and that the government never felt strong enough to really change that not the minister of defense, not the president despite the fact that we had many conversations about the need to replace the leadership of the military and so you had that I would say that the National Dialogue Conference was generally a success I think that in fact the final communique of the National Dialogue the decisions that the National Dialogue reached were legitimate and it was very difficult of course holding everybody together it was very difficult getting the Southerners to commit and the South is so deeply fractured that there was really no group certainly no individual who could speak authoritatively for what the South wanted and so you had a lot of those kinds of problems fundamentally I think that the outcome wasn't bad and that many of the elements I believe will be part of the Yemeni fabric going forward Yemeni governance, Yemeni society going forward Yemeni economics going forward and then you had the constitutional conference in Abu Dhabi over the summer of 2014 and again my understanding is that the outcome was very good and everybody signed on to it so I would say that the performance of the elements of the GCC initiative itself was pretty positive the problem that we had was that everything going on outside of the GCC initiative you had a completely dysfunctional government Abdu Rabu Mansour Hadi had his strong points and his weak points but you can certainly say that his weak point was that he never understood the politics of his own society he was never able to really provide the kind of leadership that Yemenis were looking for I think that we had a golden opportunity in 2011-2012 February 2012 when we had that election I think that Hadi genuinely did have the support of the vast majority of Yemeni people what happened afterwards is that he was unable to take that popular support translated into the delivery of change that the Yemeni people wanted he was never able to do that part of it was because of the dysfunctionality of his government it was because you had this kind of hybrid government with the GPC and the JMP both involved neither side really committed to ensuring the success of the transition never putting their best people into the government using the government for various purposes and then you had other elements including primarily Ali Abdullah Saleh and the people around him who were doing everything that they could to undermine the transition and undermine the government and so we had, as you remember we went for weeks and weeks and weeks without any power in Sana'a with continued attacks and matter with everything that was going on that frustrated the Yemeni people and basically sapped all of the positive energy out of this political transition so when you say what do you do to change that I think that the only thing that you can do to change that and again to go back to the UN process is if you can get a change in the political dynamics in Sana'a where you can take those good positive elements that came out of the GCC initiative and you can get everybody committed and basically get focused on the fact that the GCC initiative this is a transition it's not a permanent solution it was never intended to be a permanent solution it was only meant to get us from point A which was the political conflict of 2011 to point B which is to go back to the Yemeni people and give them the opportunity to say again what it is that they wanted and what kind of government they wanted and who they wanted to lead them and that was the only purpose of this this wasn't a permanent solution and to get everybody focused on that and everybody to accept that this is a legitimate transition that they want to see succeed and that they're willing to commit to the outcome of a political process I think part of the problem that we had is that neither the Houthis nor Ali Abdullah Saleh believed that they were going to win a political fight and therefore they didn't want the political fight to happen and that's why they made the move in 2014 in terms of Ali Abdullah Saleh my own view is I'm sorry that the Saudis missed him on those number of occasions that they tried and I think and I've said you know in public I've said to our friends in Riyadh and Abu Dhabi that I don't believe that there's any future in Yemen for the Saleh family I don't think that we will ever make the transition and one of the things that frustrates me is the reports that the Emiratis are talking to Ahmed about a role I think it would be I think that the worst tragedy that we could have is if at the end of this process we end up with Ali Abdullah Saleh or Ahmed Ali Saleh back in the presidential palace in Sana'a because that means that all of the suffering and everything that the Yemeni people have gone through over the six years since the beginning of the Arab Spring would be fundamentally for nothing we would be right back where we started and I think that that would be a tragedy so I think that we need to push through and at the end of the day Saleh needs to be out of the picture Adwa, we got the question on tribes waning or waxes I mean obviously during the war the tribes have stepped in and they continue to resolve conflicts they continue to of course to varying degrees they continue to maintain security in their areas and on the highways that pass through their territory but that has also been changing they've increasingly challenged and I wouldn't say the tribal structure is breaking down I mean obviously Yemeni tribes have been challenged by the war and the system has been kind of eroding but it's not it's not to the extent that we see in Afghanistan for example where 40 years of war have literally undermined the tribes so they're still there they're still functional they still have a lot to offer in terms of not just security but governance and peace and reconciliation at the local level feeding into a national level if possible but the continuation of the war is de-civilizing the tribes so just to follow up on that on first the comment of the president that's one of the big issue since 2011 we had and have a freelance president someone who doesn't want to do his full-time job you get Hadi more or less a freelance he likes to work sometimes one day when we care he doesn't want to take it as a full-time job that's one of the biggest issues you have an electronic government in Riyadh and the freelance president who isn't really happy with the job he's in right how it became tempting and that's one of the biggest challenges of 2216 if you tomorrow end up with a bestial that they go back to Sana'a I beat you most of us in Riyadh don't want to go back it's too comfortable and it's too nice and they don't have that much intention that's a problem we do have a legitimate side in Yemen and illegitimate side that's basics there is a basic side who did the coup and they are illegitimate and there is a side who more or less to a certain degree was at least illegitimate now they are both terrible sides that's the problem they are both bad sides they have both saved no chance on harming Yemen and Yemenis in various ways in various different that's an issue that has reflected in everything whether in the war whether in the negotiation, whether in the black market or whether the overall presence of the country and the overall consequences of the war in matter of ISIS and Qaida I went to Baidah the same village where Trump did his first raid actually Qaida ISIS is still a pilot a program in Yemen it's still in the pilot stage it's still trying to test out how it is going to work it will face a tremendous challenge to convert to Qaida ISIS first is too violent and then they face the same problem diplomats really face in Yemen they don't speak the local language they have a very short sighted time limit that they want to get to understand why things in Yemen take a long time and this is think of Qaida like sheikhs they are very close to the society and think of ISIS like a foreigner someone who is in a hurry someone who doesn't speak well embraced in the society that being said I don't think on the long term there will be a problem as much as Qaida Qaida in my opinion remains on Yemen more of a threat and more of a strategic threat than ISIS on the long term dangerously because of what Nadwa is talking about they can't talk to the tribe and that they can embrace it or the tribe can embrace them or vice versa ISIS is too violent for Yemenis Yemenis fight but they are not violent it's a very different society if you look into the long term the long history of violence it has been weirdly even from a political point of view managed the tribes fight for 50 years and 10 of them get killed there is a way there is an experience with conflict that comes into this country and that's why I think it doesn't have much chance now why is it always open? it's a serious problem we ask the same question but this goes back to 3,000 years we talked according to the bible we talked to Salomon we actually brought the virgins at one point we actually joined Islam by a letter it's a society and it's a country that's open pragmatic and adaptive and responsive to the world we have been marxists we have been monarchists we have joined Islam we worshiped the sun we were Christians we were Jews it's an unbelievably dynamic country and it's open for ideologies it's open for F-16 it's open for the drones it's open for all of that that's a plus and a problem but that's Yemen a very dynamic country that goes and responds and it takes a lot of it can exhaust you Nasr was there everyone was there I don't know much about the economy to be honest but it is not that promising for example from an economic point of view compared to a country like the Gulf or countries in the Gulf or other places it's not that much of a place I would add something on the economy can I just say one thing with regard to Hadi vs. Saleh a friend of mine said this is the problem in Yemen's conflict the key problem in Yemen's conflict since 2011 we have Saleh who who is not convinced that he is no longer a president and Hadi who is not convinced that he is a president that's the truth if I can just say a word on the economy it's certainly true that on the natural resources side Yemen isn't especially rich although when I was there we were certainly proposing that the US Geological Survey should come out and do they had done a study many years ago but it was at a time when the technology wasn't nearly as advanced as it is now and that we always thought that it would be worthwhile to come out and do another look at what mineral resources might be available you have the port of Aden which potentially is an extremely important economic asset you have geographical location but what I would say is the idea that we were trying to push when I was there was you have I agree completely with for his analysis of the Yemeni people you've got the people you've got 26 million people who work hard which is not always true of their neighbors and you can use Yemen really to establish various kinds of production and other things particularly low tech low energy requirements where I think that Yemen could be a source of production for the entire region and especially because if in fact the GCC follows through on some of the proposals that have been made over these last couple of years that they would bring Yemen more completely into economic association with the GCC I think that Yemen would have a lot to offer in terms of how the regional economy develops we've got time for one more question I think thank you Foat Shah from the National Center for State Courts two questions but they connect what is the end game the real real end game for the Houthis we know as the ambassador mentioned there is no future for him I highly doubt it and the Houthis are not seen as a group that's going to rule Yemen rule it in a sense of governance born Yemen a southerner and a development practitioner I cannot see the south returning back to what Yemen was civil war I was there during the civil war that people forgot about mid 1990s this was a couple years after the unification there is deep deep seated grievances in the south the idea of power sharing came in they felt that they were tricked for simply put the idea of a united Yemen is very hard to really bad them with the conflict time and time again the southerners see they don't want this anymore so my question is what is the end game of the Houthis do they want an autonomous region up north and they are happy with that do they want to be a 50-50 powerbrokers of the north what is he still trying to get from all of this his family but again what is Yemen after this war will it be like Iraq you have the Kurds you have the Shia Sunni or will it just be back to something we don't even know the Yemenis don't know so my question is the northern part and the southerners and what is their future let alone the future of Yemen as a united government thank you we can't finish that today what does one thing with Saleh specifically he thought in 2011 he can pull out the Putin-Medvedev thing he can bring someone for two years and then come back from the window that's one reason why he actually and he had a deal with Hadi about that by the way and that's why he was little frustrated he thought he can play this and for a lack of a sense of a better term he thought that the revolution was a fake view something everyone is blotting against him and he would just deal with it like he does with the crisis and comes back so that's why he became very destructive after that he wants three things today that's his end game I think in Yemen he wants immunity to continue which is a bit tricky he wants his money from sanctions this is more important to him than Saleh he wants the sanctions to be removed especially his financial one and that's a pretty tricky another condition you probably can play with it via the Iran model which is you behave, we remove some things in two years blah blah you just make sure that this is not a new license for him again to do whatever he wants and he wants his son president of the party that's his third thing and he will have to step for that he's the one blocking his son from that thing but it's this that I think his end game ultimately the Houdis are still trying to figure it they at one point thought that they can't run Yemen they were surprised they were surprised themselves they took the capital and they're like oh so we can go to Aden oh so we can go into oh okay so there was something for them actually and after that they have been just in a mood of fighting I don't think they have had the chance to reflect because as soon as they started thinking they fought with Saleh oh we actually have a problem here someone is sharing with us that's I think the most important thing into thinking about it I leave this out to the guys but one final important point I want to make is a way that everyone is addressing Yemen's conflict and it's a problem whether we speak of the Saudis or we speak of the Americans in Saudi I was also there in in June every single thing has to do with Yemen is in the hand of the intelligence there is no diplomats working on it there is no politicians doing with it in the hand of officers in the intelligence committee who have no experience in politics and who have a very similar to America's narrative toward Yemen they have a lot of data but they don't have information and there is quite a big difference and they are not able to capture Yemen this is a war but you fight it with diplomacy more than with F-16s and they have completely failed in that even the aid when it goes to Yemen is actually a military intelligence decided even the ones who deliver the aid is actually from the intelligence and that have made Saudi very much unable to understand Yemen since Prince Sultan died and since the princes were left out of these politics and they were handed to officers they never really got Yemen right and that will be one of the biggest challenges to move forward on that my very final point is about the Gulf about joining the GCC if it remains hopefully this has been one of the biggest of problems with the Gulf they have been complaining for the last three years that Yemen has fallen into the hand of Iran but they have shut down their door in front of Yemen and Yemenis for the last 30 years from joining the GCC if you are unhappy with Iran taking over then you need to open your door you cannot basically you know this attached Yemen this attached geography and then complain that it is falling into the hand of other power that's a serious issue but there is a tendency within the Gulf for some reason and I don't think it's a purpose but it's just an attitude there is a tendency to punish Yemenis for what their leaders do think of 1990 when Saleh sided with Saddam what happens instead of pushing Saleh out of power they kicked out 800,000 Yemenis from the Gulf labor and that is one of the reasons why Yemen is in the mess it is today actually it was the most expensive no in the history of the country the boat he did inside the UN Security Council to approach it was the same way that they have done with this war is deal with it the wrong way and actually not deal with the problem as it emerged in the past so with regard to unification you know I share what the father said but he talked about three different Yemenis that he saw when he Yemen and I think there is even more than that I was in aid in lost October and I saw a de facto secession the south is already succeeded in effect having said that there is a lot of disparities in the south and right now there is power struggle between the Emirates and Hadi and Hadi even though he is not very popular he still has a lot of supporters in Abiyan in the south and I think there could potentially be in the future potential power struggle between the Emirates and the Saudis in the south as well and that is true to other areas like Cairo and maybe other areas as well so Yemen unity I think sadly I think it is highly unlikely that we will see one Yemen the way it used to be I would just say I agree that you won't see Yemen as it used to be that is probably not a bad thing the national dialogue conference did come out with a recommendation on decentralization and trying to push decision making down to a more local level they did embrace the idea of federalism I think that it was mismanaged absolutely it was mismanaged it was an idea that Yemen should be a federal state is actually probably the right answer for the country I believe that unity for Yemen is absolutely an essential element not only for Yemen but for the region and the world because I think that the reality is that a divided Yemen means that you will have peace and no reason to think that Yemen if it were divided would only divide into two pieces I think it would divide at least into three and maybe even more than three pieces and all of which would be susceptible to violent extremism all of which would lack economic capacity to support the people and it would just become an enduring problem in the region so I think that we you know should continue to push for a unified Yemen but with changes in the structure that address the legitimate concerns of the people in the south as well as elsewhere and that's one main difference between UAE and Saudi Saudi realizes that the belief that Yemen must be one a remain one and because it has a different narrative toward Yemen because it shares the borders it doesn't want to deal with more than one headache it just wants one more is more than enough already it doesn't have a border and it's quite adventurous and it wants to try to test out some things including the vision of how many Yemenis there should be do you agree that federalism or some thing around it has to be the Altia ultimately but it has to be thought of the last division of labor which actually sparked this war what's happened in one week if you have to divide this room it will take you more than one month that wasn't probably the most thoughtful thing into it but it will have to be within that element I agree okay on that note we've gone over our timeline I want to thank all of you for a very rich set of presentations thank you very much