Yemen Warns Saudis of Stepped-Up Attacks If Truce Offer Rejected
TEHRAN (Tasnim) – A Yemeni minister warned the Saudi-led military coalition that it will have to brace for harsher responses from the Yemeni forces if the kingdom turns down an offer for truce.
In an interview with Al Mayadeen on Tuesday, Foreign Minister of Yemen’s National Salvation Government Hisham Sharaf said a truce proposal put forward by the Yemeni forces was aimed at peace.
The plan offered by President of Yemen’s Supreme Political Council Mahdi al-Mashat indicates that Yemenis favor peace and an end of bloodshed, Sharaf added.
“If the aggressive (Saudi-led) coalition rejects the initiative launched by the president of Yemen’s Supreme Political Council, we will have plans for response,” the foreign minister warned.
Sharaf said the Yemeni forces would offer an “olive branch” in peacetime, but in wartime, they deal such severe blows to the aggressors that the enemy would not even think of.
On Friday, Mahdi al-Mashat said the Houthi forces would end all attacks on Saudi Arabia provided that the kingdom and its allies ended their attacks on Yemen.
He also hoped that “the gesture would be answered by a stronger gesture” from the Saudis.
The Houthi proposal came a week after Yemeni strikes on Saudi Arabia’s oil installations, which knocked out half of the kingdom’s production.
Since March 2015, Saudi Arabia and some of its Arab allies have been carrying out deadly airstrikes against the Houthi Ansarullah movement in an attempt to restore power to fugitive former president Abd Rabbuh Mansour Hadi, a close ally of Riyadh.