AhlulBayt News Agency - The UN envoy said on Wednesday that Yemen’s warring parties were closer to an agreement at peace talks in Kuwait as he headed to New York to brief the Security Council.
“We are moving towards a general understanding that encompasses the expectations and visions of the parties,” Esmail Ould Shaikh Ahmad said in a statement.
“The discussions have become more sensitive and delicate bringing us closer to a comprehensive agreement,” he said.
Ould Shaikh Ahmad is to brief the UN Security Council in a closed session later on Wednesday on the progress made in the peace talks which began on April 21 but have been clouded by repeated walkouts by the delegation representing Yemen’s fugitive former president, Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi.
Face-to-face meetings resumed on Monday for the first time in nearly a week after the latest government boycott.
Ould Shaikh Ahmad said discussions on Tuesday centred on “various military and security issues including withdrawals and troop movements”.
“We are now working on overcoming various obstacles and addressing specific details of an implementation mechanism,” he said.
A Western diplomat familiar with the talks said they had made important progress.
“We are in a stage where the parties have to make hard choices and compromises,” the diplomat said, adding that he was “very optimistic” that a deal could be reached.
“We have not seen this momentum towards peace in the past one-and-a-half years ... a road map plan has been laid down ... and it has to work,” he said.
The main sticking point in the talks has been the form of government to oversee a transition.
Al Houthi and their allies have demanded a unity government.
The pro-Hadi delegation insists that the legitimacy of fugitive president must be respected.
he proposed government "would be formed on a consensual and inclusive basis and in accordance with the legal references once Sana’a and key government institutions are not under the control of non-state actors," he said.
Houthi spokesman Mohammed Abdulsalam warned that if no fair solution was reached, they would form the government in Sana’a.
"Yemenis are awaiting a fair solution and if it fails, anti-aggression national forces must fill the vacuum by forming a government to serve the people and confront challenges," Abdulsalam said on Twitter.
The Houthi delegation met late Tuesday with the ambassadors to Yemen of the United States, Britain and the European Union and called for the formation of a "consensus executive authority" in Yemen.
They also blamed Saudi Arabia for violating the ceasefire, sources close to the delegation said.
Despite a 14-month-old Saudi-led military aggression on Yemen in support of Hadi, the Houthis and their allies still control many of Yemen's most populous regions, including the central and northern highlands and the Red Sea coast.
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