The de jure leader of Yemen, President Rashad Mohammed al-Alimi of the “Presidential Leadership Council,” reproached the United Nations and greater international community for abandoning his administration in its decade-old civil war against Iran-backed Houthi terrorists in his address to the General Assembly on Monday.
The Houthis attacked the nation’s capital, Sana’a, in 2014, seizing control and forcing the legitimate government of the country, which al-Alimi represents, into the southern port city of Aden. With the aid of the Iranian Islamist regime, Houthi jihadists have dramatically expanded their influence in Yemen in the past decade. Following the siege and massacre of hundreds of people in Israel on October 7 by fellow Iranian terror proxy Hamas, the Houthis declared war on Israel – despite not being a legitimate government entity – and launched a campaign against global commercial shipping.
Houthi leaders claim that their piracy attacks on random commercial ships is targeted only at vessels engaging in commerce with Israel – or, following airstrikes by American and British forces, ships affiliated with those countries – but, in reality, they have bombed ships with no clear association to any of their targets. On some occasions, Houthi terrorists have bombed ships affiliated with countries they explicitly promised not to attack, such as Russia and China. In one instances, the Houthis attacked a ship carrying grain to their patrons in Iran.
As of September, the Houthis have launched over 200 attacks on ships in and near the Red Sea, hitting over 77 commercial ships and sinking two of them.
The United Nations, al-Alimi denounced, had done little to limit the damage of the Houthi campaign, and almost nothing to support the legitimate government’s return to uncontested power.
“Leniency with the enemies of peace leads to the most heinous wars, to the most complex and costly ones,” the Yemeni president warned. “There is an urgent need for a collective approach to support the government of Yemen and to reinforce its institutional capabilities, to protect its territorial borders, and to secure all of its national territory.”
“Without addressing these needs and without implementng the relevant international resolutions prohibiting the flow of Iranian weapons and drying up the founding sources,” al-Alimi said, “these militias will not engage in any efforts to achieve just and comprehensive peace – and they will not refrain from blackmailing the regional and international communities.”
“Houthi militias, with their ongoing terrorist attacks on international maritime navigation in the Red Sea and the surrounding waterways, prove that they represent a growing threat,” he continued, “not just to Yemen, as some used to believe, but also to the stability of the region as a whole and to the secure flow of international trade.”
“Today,” he observed, the Houthis “are reinforcing their position as the first rebel group in history having used ballistic missiles and drones against civilian commercial vessels.”
Al-Alimi especially condemned Iran for providing a vast arsenal of advanced weaponry to Houthis terrorists and those “minimizing the role of Iran and of their weapons and proxies in destabilizing Yemen, the region, and the world.”
The Yemeni president also acknowledged the Houthi mass abduction of aid workers in June who were operating in Houthi-controlled territories, but blamed the United Nations in part for the attack on humanitarian workers because, he claimed, they disregarded his government’s call to vacate the areas where the attacks occurred.
“There is a widespread belief that the United Nations is responsible for giving these militias the opportunity to kidnap this unprecedented number of relief workers and NGO staff,” al-Alimi said, “by not heeding the call of the Yemeni government to transfer the headquarters from Sana’a to the temporary capital Aden.”
“By not taking seriously these militias and by keeping their headquarters in Sana’a, the United Nations unintentionally enabled these terrorists to take their personnel as hostages,” he condemned, “and to use them as a bargaining chip to blackmail the international community.”
The Yemeni president did not name any state actors in particular regarding the failure of the international community to respond to Houthi attacks, though the government of leftist American President Joe Biden has spearheaded the largest failed effort to do so: “Operation Prosperity Guardian,” an alleged coalition of countries who committed vaguely to help protect commercial shipping in the greater Red Sea region. The coalition was announced in December, allegedly intended to escort commercial ships and discourage Houthi attacks but, nearly a year later, it is unclear exactly what actions are being taken under the “Prosperity Guardian” banner or if it has successfully prevent any major Houthi attacks.
In June, a coalition of prominent actors in the shipping industry signed a letter published by the World Shipping Council demanding that state actors do more to protect international commerce from the Houthi threat.
“We call for States with influence in the region to safeguard our innocent seafarers and for the swift de-escalation of the situation in the Red Sea,” the letter read. “We have heard the condemnation and appreciate the words of support, but we urgently seek action to stop the unlawful attacks on these vital workers and this vital industry.”
Al-Alimi concluded with a boilerplate condemnation of Israel’s self-defense operations against Hamas, failing to recognize the alliance between Hamas and the Houthis keeping his administration outside of his country’s capital and instead demanding Israel cease its operations against the Iran-backed terrorist proxy.
