March 30, 2010
Yemen calls on international donors to honor aid pledges - Minister says country needs funds to combat poverty, unemployment
Agence France Presse
ABU DHABI: Yemen told international donors at a meeting in Abu Dhabi on Monday that it urgently needs to receive their pledged financial aid to combat poverty and unemployment.
“The need is increasingly urgent for the mobilization of [financial] resources” promised at a London conference in 2006, Deputy Planning Minister Hisham Sharaf Abdullah told the Friends of Yemen meeting.
He said the billions promised were needed to “reduce poverty and unemployment” in Yemen, a poor neighbor of the oil-rich Gulf Arab monarchies.
“The government has undertaken reforms … but the road is still long and requires a combination of efforts to meet the challenges that hinder development and undermine the foundations of security and stability,” he added.
Representatives from about 20 Arab and Western countries met for the workshop co-chaired by the United Arab Emirates (UAE) hosts and Germany to address economy and good governance issues in Yemen.
The Friends of Yemen meeting which Sanaa wanted held in Berlin was planned at a January conference in London to help Yemen combat a resurgent Al-Qaeda.
But the scheduled two-day meeting in the Emirati capital was concluded in a single day.
Sanaa wants development aid to head off the Al-Qaeda threat but an earlier conference held in the Saudi capital in late February failed to produce concrete results.
Instead, the Riyadh meeting of Yemen’s Gulf neighbors focused on why much of the $5.7billion in pledged international aid remained unused by Sanaa, which has fought a war with Shiite rebels in the north and faces separatist demands in the country’s south.
At least $3.7 billion of the aid was pledged by the six-member Gulf Cooperation Council, which comprises Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the UAE.
The rest came in from other donors including the US, Japan, the European Union and organizations such as the World Bank, United Nations, and Islamic Development Bank.
“Until 2009, the GCC honored 15 percent of its commitments, and we hope this will rise to 30 percent this year,” Abdullah told reporters, noting that Western donors were meeting their quotas through annual cooperation programs.
Abdullah presented a five-year development plan for 2011-15 for projects which he said would need around $44 billion in funding.
Sanaa aims through the plan to curb unemployment, which affects 34 percent of youth in Yemen, where under-24s account for 68 percent of the population, and reduce poverty which afflicts 40 percent of Yemenis, he said.
Meanwhile, oil revenues, which constitute 70 percent of the Arabian Peninsula state’s revenues are declining steadily, Abdullah added.
For his part, the UAE deputy foreign minister, Khaled Ghanem al-Ghaith, assured Sanaa of the donors’ support but stressed the need to improve security in the country.
Yemeni security is threatened by a resurgence of Al-Qaeda, a separatist movement in the south, and a shaky truce with northern Shiite rebels.
On the eve of the meeting, Human Rights Watch called on donors to “emphasize improving justice and the rule of law to reverse the deteriorating human rights situation in Yemen,” linking rights to aid.
Although aware of the need to help Yemen, donors want to ensure their aid goes to correct use in a country plagued by corruption, a phenomenon frequently condemned by the Yemeni opposition and non-governmental organizations.
A series of talks are scheduled to follow, including a ministerial meeting in May in Riyadh, and another in September in New York, according to Yemeni officials.
The increased interest in Yemen follows a December 25 botched attempt to blow up an American airliner that was claimed by Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, the group’s Yemen-based affiliate.
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=10&categ_id=2&article_id=113243#axzz0jdHKDEpc
Yemen calls on international donors to honor aid pledges - Minister says country needs funds to combat poverty, unemployment
Agence France Presse
ABU DHABI: Yemen told international donors at a meeting in Abu Dhabi on Monday that it urgently needs to receive their pledged financial aid to combat poverty and unemployment.
“The need is increasingly urgent for the mobilization of [financial] resources” promised at a London conference in 2006, Deputy Planning Minister Hisham Sharaf Abdullah told the Friends of Yemen meeting.
He said the billions promised were needed to “reduce poverty and unemployment” in Yemen, a poor neighbor of the oil-rich Gulf Arab monarchies.
“The government has undertaken reforms … but the road is still long and requires a combination of efforts to meet the challenges that hinder development and undermine the foundations of security and stability,” he added.
Representatives from about 20 Arab and Western countries met for the workshop co-chaired by the United Arab Emirates (UAE) hosts and Germany to address economy and good governance issues in Yemen.
The Friends of Yemen meeting which Sanaa wanted held in Berlin was planned at a January conference in London to help Yemen combat a resurgent Al-Qaeda.
But the scheduled two-day meeting in the Emirati capital was concluded in a single day.
Sanaa wants development aid to head off the Al-Qaeda threat but an earlier conference held in the Saudi capital in late February failed to produce concrete results.
Instead, the Riyadh meeting of Yemen’s Gulf neighbors focused on why much of the $5.7billion in pledged international aid remained unused by Sanaa, which has fought a war with Shiite rebels in the north and faces separatist demands in the country’s south.
At least $3.7 billion of the aid was pledged by the six-member Gulf Cooperation Council, which comprises Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the UAE.
The rest came in from other donors including the US, Japan, the European Union and organizations such as the World Bank, United Nations, and Islamic Development Bank.
“Until 2009, the GCC honored 15 percent of its commitments, and we hope this will rise to 30 percent this year,” Abdullah told reporters, noting that Western donors were meeting their quotas through annual cooperation programs.
Abdullah presented a five-year development plan for 2011-15 for projects which he said would need around $44 billion in funding.
Sanaa aims through the plan to curb unemployment, which affects 34 percent of youth in Yemen, where under-24s account for 68 percent of the population, and reduce poverty which afflicts 40 percent of Yemenis, he said.
Meanwhile, oil revenues, which constitute 70 percent of the Arabian Peninsula state’s revenues are declining steadily, Abdullah added.
For his part, the UAE deputy foreign minister, Khaled Ghanem al-Ghaith, assured Sanaa of the donors’ support but stressed the need to improve security in the country.
Yemeni security is threatened by a resurgence of Al-Qaeda, a separatist movement in the south, and a shaky truce with northern Shiite rebels.
On the eve of the meeting, Human Rights Watch called on donors to “emphasize improving justice and the rule of law to reverse the deteriorating human rights situation in Yemen,” linking rights to aid.
Although aware of the need to help Yemen, donors want to ensure their aid goes to correct use in a country plagued by corruption, a phenomenon frequently condemned by the Yemeni opposition and non-governmental organizations.
A series of talks are scheduled to follow, including a ministerial meeting in May in Riyadh, and another in September in New York, according to Yemeni officials.
The increased interest in Yemen follows a December 25 botched attempt to blow up an American airliner that was claimed by Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, the group’s Yemen-based affiliate.
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=10&categ_id=2&article_id=113243#axzz0jdHKDEpc
