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Development plan needed for peace in Yemen

The Gulf Initiative has failed to bring peace to Yemen, prompting the need for a new initiative that is more realistic and includes a long-term economic and development plan.

A street vendor chews qat, a mild stimulant, as he sits by his vegetable stall at a market place in the Old Sanaa city March 19, 2014. Qat dominates life in Yemen, where most men spend half the day chewing it, even at work, and experts say it is ravaging Yemen's frail economy and sucking up precious water. REUTERS/Khaled Abdullah (YEMEN - Tags: SOCIETY ENVIRONMENT) - RTR3HSAZ
A street vendor chews qat, a mild stimulant, as he sits by his vegetable stall at a market place in Old Sanaa, March 19, 2014. — REUTERS/Khaled Abdullah

Yemeni state institutions suffered a collapse after the fragile political process sponsored by Gulf states and the UN Security Council ground to a halt after three years. This collapse put a definitive end to Western praise for the Yemeni paradigm, considered by some as the model for solving conflicts in the region.

The Gulf Initiative succeeded in transferring power and ending armed hostilities in Yemen, but it has failed to instill peace. The cause of that failure stems from the core tenet being legally and in other ways flawed to the extent that it is difficult to rectify. Perhaps this difficulty stems from the unattainable desire to placate all factions at the expense of all other considerations, and irrespective of the Yemenis’ dream to build a true state, or perhaps because the initiative did not include an economic or development plan that could win the Yemeni people’s trust. Furthermore, the regional and international commitment to Yemen’s unity, security and stability was not accompanied by real, long-term plans, but by local anesthesia that numbed the pain here and there.

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