Zarif calls for Yemeni solution to Yemen situation

Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif has called for a ceasefire in Yemen, which is being bombarded by Saudi warplanes since late March.

“Yemen’s issue only has a Yemeni solution,” Zarif said at a joint press conference with Sartaj Aziz, the Pakistani premier’s adviser on national security and foreign affairs, in the capital Islamabad on Wednesday.

“The people of Yemen should not have to face aerial bombardment,” he added, calling for an urgent ceasefire.

The Iranian foreign minister noted that all countries “including Iran, and Saudi Arabia” should help to end the war against the impoverished country.

“It is up to Yemen how it wants to do it. We can only facilitate [the process] as countries in the region,” Zarif said.

Zarif’s two-day visit to Pakistan began on Wednesday following his meeting with Omani Foreign Minister Yusuf bin Alawi in Muscat earlier in the day.

The high-ranking diplomat, who is visiting Pakistan at the head of a 22-member delegation, is scheduled to meet Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on Thursday.

Saudi Arabia’s air campaign in Yemen started on March 26 in a bid to restore power to former Yemeni President Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi, a close ally of Riyadh.

On March 25, the embattled president fled Aden, where he had sought to set up a rival power base, to Riyadh after Ansarullah revolutionaries advanced on Aden, where fighting continues.