Houthi's rejection of the principle of "all for all"... Failure besieges the prisoners' negotiations again
English - Tuesday 14 March 2023 الساعة 04:58 pm
Aden, NewsYemen:
The Houthi militia, the Iranian arm in Yemen, has refused to release prisoners and detainees, according to the principle of "all for all," according to a source in the government team negotiating prisoners and detainees currently taking place in Geneva, Switzerland.
Last Saturday, the first meetings of the new negotiating round began in the Swiss city of Geneva, with the participation of the delegations of the Yemeni government and the Houthis, and under the auspices of the Office of the UN Envoy to Yemen Hans Grundberg, head of the supervisory committee that was formed in 2018 in order to release all prisoners, abductees and disappeared persons based on the Stockholm Agreement in Sweden, signed on December 13, 2018.
The source said that the Houthi militia is evading the release of all prisoners based on the "all for all" rule, while adhering to the exchange of specific lists whose names were selected according to the "dynasty" criterion, which is the same reason that thwarted the previous rounds of negotiations.
He stated that the first negotiation session began with a discussion about what was agreed upon in the previous rounds, and the Yemeni government delegation asked to "negotiate according to the principle of (all for all), but the Houthis requested that the exchange be divided."
The new prisoner negotiations come in the context of implementing a previous agreement between the Yemeni government and the Houthis, announced in March 2022, to exchange more than 2,000 prisoners and abductees from both sides, but it faltered due to the Houthis' obstruction.
