Iran supports “any effective role” of the United Nations towards ending the conflict in Yemen, its foreign minister said yesterday after meeting the UN envoy to the war-torn country in Tehran.
Martin Griffiths, the UN special envoy for Yemen, has been in Tehran since Sunday to meet with Iranian officials as part of “efforts to support a political solution” to the conflict in the Arab nation, according to a statement from his office.
Iran has backed the Houthi rebels during the six-year-old war against Yemen’s internationally recognised government, supported since 2015 by a military coalition.
Iran rejects accusations that it has supplied the Houthis with weapons.
During meetings with Griffiths, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohamed Javad Zarif expressed the “full readiness” of his country “to support any effective role of the United Nations in resolving the crisis”. He underscored the “very difficult conditions resulting from the war and the economic blockade imposed on the Yemeni people”, according to a ministry statement. “The only solution to the Yemen crisis is through politics and not through imposed war,” he added.
Yemen’s grinding conflict has killed tens of thousands and displaced millions, triggering what the UN calls the world’s worst humanitarian disaster.
A handout picture provided by the Iranian foreign ministry shows Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohamed Javad Zarif (centre-left) during his meeting with Martin Griffiths (centre-right), special representative of the United Nations’ secretary general for Yemen, in Tehran, yesterday.
