Saudis to blame for Yemen talks failure: Commentator

Press TV has conducted an interview with Hussein al-Bukhaiti, activist and political commentator in Sana’a, to discuss the ongoing crisis in Yemen.

The following is a rough transcription of the interview.

Press TV: Looking at almost two months of this Saudi bombardment that is deemed illegal by the UN and of course this UN meeting that has been canceled at this point does not bring much hope in terms of any type of political reconciliation. How do you see the situation panning out overall?

Bukhaiti: What I see actually in Yemen that the blockade continued, Saudi attack continued and they bomb the same place again and again and they are bombing homes, villages, farms, they just try to destroy as much as they can before any settlement or before any meeting in Geneva.

As long as the Saudis will interfere in any coming talk, we will not reach any agreement. We have seen that in Sana’a when we were about to reach an agreement, the Saudis started their air campaign and this was said by Mr. Benomar, the former UN envoy in Yemen, to the Washington Post when he insisted that the Saudis were the reason for the collapse and the failure of the talk.

So if the UN would want any future talk to come to an agreement, they must not let any precondition by the Saudis and the Saudi allies, and we should start where we stopped in Sana’a and this is the only way that will take Yemen from this crisis.

Press TV: The mere fact that Saudi Arabia presses UN envoy and that UN envoy has to resign and a new one to come onboard would deem to be something that would be illegal and yet we do not have any reaction really coming through. Of course we have the new UN envoy who has been trying to push for some type of deal to come through on the political front. The other active players from the UN are not pressing so much for this such as the US. Why do you think Yemen is sort of pushed off to the side and not given the urgency that it needs to be given when we look at the death toll at this point over 4,000?

Bukhaiti: It is all about money and oil money, and you know that the Saudis and the [Persian] Gulf states have a lot of money. We have seen this just as an example that there was a report released by Amnesty International and in this report they said that 90 percent of the casualties and deaths in Sana’a is because of the anti-aircraft guns. In Yemen see that the UN, we see some known human rights agencies that they use lies and they take the side of the aggressor, the side of the people who attack Yemen, this really makes it feel and it is all about the Saudi money, and this new UN envoy soon he will realize why Benomar was accused by the Saudis and by Hadi of being Houthi, why he was accused of helping the Houthis, because I am sure soon enough the new UN envoy will face the same problem by the Saudis that his former colleague has seen in Yemen.

AHK/HSN

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