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Saudi pressure behind Yemen plane delay: Yemeni politician

A plane carrying representatives from Yemeni political factions to UN-brokered peace talks in Switzerland was grounded at Djibouti’s international airport for several hours on Monday. (File photo)

A Yemeni politician says Saudi pressure was behind the move by the governments of Egypt and Sudan to deny their airspace to a plane carrying representatives from Yemeni political factions to UN-brokered peace talks in the Swiss city of Geneva, Press TV reports.

Muhammad Muhammad Abdullah al-Zubairi, the general assistant to the Arabic Baath Social Party, who is in Geneva to participate in UN-brokered peace talks for Yemen, told Press TV on Tuesday that Saudi Arabia engaged in a “dirty game” by pressuring Sudan and Egypt not to allow entry to the Yemeni plane on Monday.

“The UN had hired a private South African airliner. We obviously needed to head to Djibouti first, and from there travel all the way to Geneva. Given the fact that we required permission to enter Egyptian and Sudanese airspace, and the two countries are parties to the Saudi onslaught against Yemen, they did not give us any permission to fly over. This is why our plane was delayed,” Zubairi said through an interpreter.

Zubairi added that Yemen’s Houthi Ansarullah movement and its allies are prepared to engage in direct negotiations with Saudi Arabia in case the United Nations invites Saudi authorities to the talks.

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon (4-R) speaks next to UN Special Envoy for Yemen Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed with representatives of former the Yemeni government in the UN offices in Geneva, Switzerland, at the opening of Yemen peace talks, June 15, 2015. (© AFP)

The Yemeni politician, however, strongly rejected any talks with representatives of Yemen’s fugitive former President Abd Rabbuh Mansour Hadi, who is a staunch ally of Riyadh.

Delegations of several Yemeni factions, including the Ansarullah movement, missed the first day of the negotiations, which began on Monday, because Egypt and reportedly Sudan denied their airspace to their plane.

The UN-brokered peace talks come as Riyadh is pushing ahead with its military campaign against its impoverished southern neighbor.

Meanwhile, Saudi warplanes carried out several airstrikes across Yemen on Tuesday.

Yemenis search for survivors under the rubble of houses in the UNESCO-listed heritage site in the old city of the Yemeni capital, Sana’a, on June 12, 2015, following an overnight Saudi airstrike. (© AFP)

An educational center in the Sahar district of the northwestern province of Sa’ada was targeted in an airstrike. There has been no information about possible casualties and the extent of damage inflicted, yet.

Five women and a child also lost their lives in a similar attack on a house in the city of Ta’izz, located about 260 kilometers (166 miles) south of the capital, Sana’a.

Saudi Arabia started the military campaign against Yemen on March 26 – without a UN mandate – in an attempt to weaken the Houthi Ansarullah movement and bring Hadi back to power.

The United Nations (UN) says at least 2,600 people have been killed and 7,300 others wounded due to the conflict in Yemen since March 19.

MP/HSN/HJL


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