Daily Times

A free and fair media is a benchmark of democracy. That much is understood. Yet linked to this is the way in which war is covered. And in the West, much of the fourth estate has failed to live up to its own mandate. Never more so than in Yemen.

The country is one of the world’s poorest. Three years of warfare have left two-thirds of the population dependent on aid and around 400,000 children severely malnourished. According to International Crisis Group (ICG), more than 8.4 million are on the verge of starvation. All of which has led the UN to describing Yemen as the world’s most devastating humanitarian crisis of the last 50 years.

This is what three years of warfare have done to the Yemeni people. Yet much of the western media still insists on dismissing this as a proxy conflict; as if this somehow renders such suffering permissible. In truth, it is anything but. For the Saudi-led coalition is strongly backed by Britain, France and the US. All of whom profit from peddling extremely lucrative arms deal to Riyadh. On the other side is Iran. Thus underscoring how the military aggression has been internationalised from the beginning.

Yet this is conveniently forgotten as the talk turns to the UN and its recently appointed special envoy. The world community of peace-loving nations are now seeking to make this global institution, whose charter they see fit to violate at will, responsible for securing a negotiated settlement between the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) and the so-called Houthi rebels to save the Red Sea port city of Hodeida and its 600,000-strong population from further ambush.

Indeed, pundits have taken to presenting this as an opportunity to make or break Yemen as they point out that the UAE, which is leading the military push, is looking for a way out. At least in terms of minimising losses. These are the same forces which have been plagued for the last year by inmate allegations of Abu Ghraib-style sexual torture and rape in Emirati-run prisons. The Houthi, for their part, have now signalled willingness to hand over the port to UN control. Though the coalition is asking for nothing less than a total withdrawal from Hodeida as well as a surrender of all weapons and cutting ties with Iran.

If, however, the world body is to play the role of honest broker — securing a ceasefire can only be the first step in a series of immediate short-term measures. For no peace can be negotiated unless and until accountability is added into the mix. And this must mean constituting a war crimes tribunal. Indeed, the world body last year agreed to probe such allegations while Human Rights Watch (HRW) spoke of the laws of war being violated with impunity. Yet such a move must have the full backing of the international community. For to do otherwise will risk the rewriting of history by the victors of corporate warfare.

Published in Daily Times, June 24^th 2018.