Britain’s approach to Yemen has been both naïve and duplicitous

The British government resigned itself to war in Yemen long before the Saudi-led coalition carried out its first sorties against Houthi-held targets in March this year. That’s according to a series of damning British government documents I have seen regarding “Friends of Yemen”, a diplomatic effort supposedly spearheaded by Britain to aid peaceful transition in the country. A joint initiative between the Republic of Yemen, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the UK, its last meeting was in September 2014.

Following the disruption of an Al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) attack on an airliner bound for Detroit on Christmas Day 2009, Britain convened a meeting on 27 January 2010 which launched Friends of Yemen. Plans were already being discussed for such a group, according to the Foreign Office, and the foiled plot merely acted as a catalyst.

The basic idea was for Friends of Yemen to provide a forum which would bring the Gulf States together with the Yemeni authorities to maintain the momentum on both political reconciliation and aid pledges, while galvanising the international community to give generously.

Nine months later, Britain’s Foreign Secretary, William Hague, co-chaired a meeting with his Yemeni counterpart Dr Abu Bakr Al Qirbi and Saudi Arabian Deputy Foreign Minister HRH Prince Turki. Foreign Office Minister Alistair Burt MP and Minister of State for International Development Alan Duncan MP were also at the meeting. While the situation on the ground was tense, the discussions focused on preparing the country for IMF funding, de-radicalisation, promoting dialogue and dealing with some key infrastructure issues.

An aid package was put together gradually from amongst Friends of Yemen’s impressive membership, which included the Sunni Arab states, the US, France, Russia, Germany, Denmark, Indonesia, Italy, Malaysia, Czech Republic and South Korea. International organisations included the League of Arab States, Delegation of the European Union, Gulf Cooperation Council Secretariat, Islamic Development Bank, International Monetary Fund, the Organisation for Islamic Cooperation and the World Bank; the UN also pitched in.

In 2011, as President Saleh faced street protests and the country slipped further into instability, Friends of Yemen decided that attempts at peaceful dialogue weren’t worth it. All meetings for that year were cancelled. Later, the Gulf States put through their own proposal for transitioning Saleh out of power, while the UN appointed its own special envoy. The dream of a grand transnational union of countries aimed at addressing Yemen’s crisis was crumbling.

By May 2012, the group had agreed to meet again. That meeting focused on how to support the GCC transition plan, while a second, held on the fringes of the UN General Assembly meeting in September, discussed delivery of an $8 billion international aid package. Much of that money was never to arrive. Further meetings held in 2013 noted that only one in five of the dollars pledged had actually made it into Yemen, while only half of the pledges had actually been approved formally. To make matters worse, the political and security situation in Yemen was deteriorating rapidly.

I have seen an independent analysis of Friends of Yemen conducted by a Foreign Office analyst in Whitehall. “By the September 2013 meeting,” it noted, “the scale of political divisions had become apparent, and the National Dialogue Conference was already by then a number of weeks late in concluding… What perhaps was becoming clear was that Yemen is entering a further phase in political transition to which Friends of Yemen would need to adapt.”

Friends of Yemen hoped to maintain influence over the NDC through accelerating the delivery of aid. Yet progress on this crucial area remained glacial. A particular problem was that the same states who had designed the transition process, the Gulf countries led by Saudi Arabia, were amongst the worst offenders for not delivering on their aid promises.

Leading the pack, while also co-chairing Friends of Yemen, was Britain’s ally Saudi Arabia. By September 2014, Friends of Yemen reported that only thirty per cent of the three billion dollars Saudi Arabia had pledged two years before had actually arrived. Kuwait had promised $500m of which just $10m had been transferred, and none of the UAE’s $150m had been made available. The Arab Fund, which had promised a further $500m, had delivered just $6.5m.

In stark contrast, 70 per cent of the Western aid packages had been delivered, with the notable outlier being the World Bank, which had delivered just under a third of the half a billion it had pledged. Britain pledged $300m and had duly delivered over 90 per cent.

Having failed to deliver their promised aid, Saudi Arabia and the other Gulf States would soon begin a bombing campaign in Yemen which extended gradually to target Shia mosques and cultural sites, inflicting civilian casualties and ensuring a ticking-off from the UN, which had previously sat alongside Saudi Arabia in Friends of Yemen. The military campaign continues to provoke controversy, particularly with regards to Britain’s silence over alleged abuses by Saudi-led forces.

Behind the scenes, Friends of Yemen is considered by Britain’s Foreign Office as a waste of money. Funding for the programme was ranked in the two most recent value-for-money assessments as “B” – “Moderately not meeting expectations”.

Fulfilment of each country’s commitments agreed at Friends of Yemen meetings was described as “varied, with most experiencing delays”. Feedback collected from foreign office officials about the efficacy of these meetings was deemed “mixed”. A second internal assessment, published by the British government in January 2015, noted that “high-level (foreign minister or equivalent) attendance at the Meetings has been progressively declining since 2012.”

The reasons for the failure are clear. Aid-led engagement with Yemen has always been problematic; the West gives aid to Yemen because it wants to thwart the rise of AQAP, but this creates a perverse disincentive for Sanaa never to fully remove the group from the scene. For credibility, Friends of Yemen relied on the Gulf States, which could only ever represent one side of the peace process and proved duplicitous in promising aid which never arrived. The power balance between the two chairs, Britain and Saudi Arabia, was also heavily tilted in favour of Riyadh, at a time when London was desperately trying to complete a series of multi-billion dollar arms deals that provoked simpering obsequience to Saudi interests rather than the necessary tough rhetoric from Whitehall.

In theory, Friends of Yemen still exists, though it has no further meetings scheduled. Its profile in Westminster is clearly miniscule; in June, Keith Vaz MP had to write to the Foreign Office Minister Tobias Ellwood MP to enquire whether the group was even still active. “The UK remains committed to the objectives of the group, and the important co-ordination mechanism it offers,” was the answer. Far from a British and Saudi-led international effort to achieve peace in Yemen, the group has become little more than a secretariat for chasing the Gulf States to make their aid payments; given that they have just invaded Yemen, this looks unlikely to be done any time soon.

Britain is thus left looking, though earnest in intention, a little naïve to have ever co-chaired a group with Saudi Arabia. It is also a little duplicitous for giving such enthusiastic support to the new Saudi approach, which includes what increasingly look like serious war crimes being committed by Britain’s former partner for peace.

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.