On November 3, 2020, Russian International Affairs Council and the Embassy of the Republic of Yemen to the Russian Federation held an online seminar “Russia and Yemen: Security in the Gulf and the Red Sea Region”.
The participants discussed the current state and prospects of Russia-Yemen relations, as well as security issues in the Gulf and the Red Sea region. The experts paid special attention to the current state of the crisis and the humanitarian situation in Yemen, approaches to the regional security system, as well as the role of external actors in this process. Ahmed Salem Al-WAHISHI, H.E. Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the Republic of Yemen to the Russian Federation, made opening remarks.
On November 3, 2020, Russian International Affairs Council and the Embassy of the Republic of Yemen to the Russian Federation held an online seminar “Russia and Yemen: Security in the Gulf and the Red Sea Region”.
The participants discussed the current state and prospects of Russia-Yemen relations, as well as security issues in the Gulf and the Red Sea region. The experts paid special attention to the current state of the crisis and the humanitarian situation in Yemen, approaches to the regional security system, as well as the role of external actors in this process. Ahmed Salem Al-WAHISHI, H.E. Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the Republic of Yemen to the Russian Federation, made opening remarks.
Speakers:
Vasily Kuznetsov, Director, Center for Arab and Islamic Studies, Institute of Oriental Studies at the Russian Academy of Sciences, RIAC Member;
Sergey Serebrov, Senior Research Fellow, Center for Arab and Islamic Studies, Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences;
Vladimir Bartenev, Director of the Center for Security and Development Studies (CSDS), School of World Politics at the Lomonosov Moscow State University; Senior Research Fellow of the Centre for Arab and Islamic Studies at the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences.
Ruslan Mamedov, RIAC Program Manager, moderated the event.
During his opening speech, Ahmed Salem Al-WAHISHI, H.E. Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the Republic of Yemen to the Russian Federation, focused on the history of relations between Russia and Yemen. Thus, he recalled the fact that in 1926 Russia had recognized the independence of Yemen and in 1928 the two countries had signed the Treaty of Friendship, that marked the beginning of friendship lasting more than nine decades. He said: “The ideological tendency was very much influencing the foreign policy of Russia but not totally. They were having all these internationalist movements, conferences on the ideological basis and this was one side. But even at that time, there was the pragmatic side – the conference of the people of the East, held in Baku in 1920. Moscow was extending its hands and expressing its readiness to have the relations with many of the countries in the Islamic world”.
The ambassador spoke about different spheres of cooperation from economic one to security.
First of all, he underlined the fact that in his country, Houthi militia were fighting against the legal government recognized by the international community. He said: “We look with a lot of hope to a very important role of Russia, as a permanent member of the Security Council, in supporting the UN efforts to achieve peace in our country through the special envoy Mr. Martin Griffiths”. Moreover, the ambassador expressed the hope that Russian companies would be able to help to reconstruct the country after the peace was achieved. He gave some examples of large economic projects made in Yemen by Russian companies: port of Hodeida, power station in Aden, dams in Tihama etc. Secondly, he noted the importance of the cultural cooperation and said that tens of thousands of Yemenis had already graduated from Russian Universities and they had helped the country a lot. What is more, there is political and military cooperation between Russia and Yemen since there are lot of agreements signed by the countries and military equipment is supplied by Russia. Also, he underlined the fact that the two countries had “common positions and a lot of understanding on the political level, including how to achieve a long-lasting peace in the Middle East and solve the Palestinian problem”.
As for the prospect of cooperation, Mr. Al-WAHISHI mentioned a joint commission, that last meeting of which had been held in 2014 in Sana, and expressed his expectations for the next meeting. He also noted the importance of encouraging maritime navigation between our countries.
In his speech, the ambassador paid great attention to security issues. He spoke about recent Russian initiative for the security concept for the Gulf area. However, this concept faces with serious skepticism. Mr. Al-WAHISHI compared the initiative with Helsinki Forum for Peace and Cooperation: “When it was initiated some big powers outside Europe also didn’t join it, thinking it could be some bureaucratic thing. But when this process developed and started to be effective, big powers outside Europe felt that this mechanism was helpful and they joined it”. He is sure that the initiative “is a chance to search for common ground between the parties in the region or with other partners in the world as the security and peace of the Gulf and the Red sea will influence not only the regional peace but the world peace as well”. This concept may also bring the blue economy, which means sustainable development for those countries who are having access to the Gulf and the Red sea. According to the ambassador, “there should be collective security and that is why we should find comprehensive character for security which covers the sovereignty of the regional countries and non-interference in the internal affairs”. Moreover, he mentioned the possibility of turning the region into a zone free of weapons of mass destruction, but “this could only be done if we have any measures of confidence building measures through transparency, arms control”.
Furthermore, the ambassador claimed that there was a very serious environmental challenge: due to the erosion of the sea and the big tanker with more than 1 million barrels of oil situated in Hodeida, a huge environmental catastrophe might happen.
At the end if his speech, Mr. Al-WAHISHI said that maritime security was extremely important because in that part of the world a lot of economic vessels carrying goods and oil were passing.
Vasily Kuznetsov, Director, Center for Arab and Islamic Studies, Institute of Oriental Studies at the Russian Academy of Sciences, RIAC Member, during his presentation mentioned that Russian concept was not unique and there were several different approaches. For example, American one based on the idea that security system in the region can be built on the basis of isolation of Iran. Nevertheless, international cooperation seemed necessary to resolve the Yemen conflict. Also he said: “To make the process more doable we should work on some concrete issues. Maybe the ecological problem, maybe some humanitarian problems, especially in Yemen, maybe maritime security. These 3 points could be most productive for the cooperation. Cooperation should be multilateral”.
Sergey Serebrov, Senior Research Fellow, Center for Arab and Islamic Studies, Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences, said: “The core point of all these issues (ecological, geopolitical, political, military etc.) are related to the security issues in the Gulf and the Red sea. All of them are now bound together in one question: how to achieve peace in Yemen?”. The speaker focused on the features of that conflict and on the latest development. But his main point was connected with the fact that International Recovery Platform (IRP) “was steadily declining its influence inside Yemen. This is why without changing the UN Resolution 2216, there is no guarantee that IRP will be important player in the future and this is very bad for the peace process”.
Vladimir Bartenev, Director of the Center for Security and Development Studies (CSDS), School of World Politics at the Lomonosov Moscow State University; Senior Research Fellow of the Centre for Arab and Islamic Studies at the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences, payed great attention to humanitarian issues. He divided all the risks that may cause problems to that process in 3 groups: underlying risks that determine external assistance (such as state fragility, increase in poverty etc.), impeding risks that hinder provision of external assistance (such as security risks, lack of humanitarian access etc.) and accompanying risks that exacerbates external assistance (such as deterioration of governance, fueling conflict etc.). Also, he underlined that there was the world’s worst humanitarian crisis and gave some statistics on the topic. At the same time, international community tries to help Yemenis. Thus, the amount of assistance raised from 800 million dollars in 2011 to 8 billion dollars in 2018. However, according to the speaker, it is not enough for long-term development. What is more, “COVID-19 has limited donors’ capacities”. As for Russian multilateral assistance, it is quite high but not enough. “Even Sweden provides 10 times more than Russia in terms of multilateral aid through UN assistance”. And bilaterally Russia also provided tones of emergency food aid since 2012 as well as different scholarships, aid for some Yemeni refugees and aid by Russian HGOs. V. Bartenev believes that Russia can’t increase the number of its aid due to several reasons, so “its contribution should be more political and diplomatic”.
In conclusion, the speaker said that the first priority was to work towards minimizing impeding risks that make assistance to Yemen less effective right now. This includes ensuring greater transparency of aid distribution, larger humanitarian access, countering practices of withholding aid for political processes. Another priority, according to V. Bartenev, is to minimize accompanying risks by pushing conflict sensitive approaches to providing humanitarian assistance in the country. “But definitely a priority number 1 right now is to minimize underlying risks. So basically, working towards complete ceasefire and political settlement”.
