Yemen: Iran’s diplomacy shifts gear

The visit by Turkish Prime Minister Recep Erdogan to Tehran on Tuesday ended up with the two Middle Eastern regional powers taking a common stance regarding the situation in Yemen. Erdogan even made a call for “mediation role” by the two countries — not only in Yemen but also in Syria. This is a radical departure from the earlier Turkish position, which was initially supportive of the Saudi-led military intervention in Yemen and critical of Iran’s role.

The Iranian President Hassan Rouhani lost no time to endorse Erdogan’s remarks, saying “We both believed that it is necessary for us to witness the end of war and bloodletting in Yemen as soon as possible.”

The Iran-Turkey common platform is significant as these are the two key non-Arab states in the Muslim Middle East and they also abhor the sectarian Sunni-Shi’ite divide. This becomes a ‘critical mass’, which Iranian diplomacy has rapidly begun building on, with Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif proceeding from Tehran on Wednesday on a tour of Oman and Pakistan.

Why Oman? To be sure, Oman enjoys an important and special place in Iran’s regional diplomacy for a variety of reasons. The fact that Zarif chose Muscat for his first visit abroad after the negotiation of the framework agreement with the world powers in Lausanne last Thursday is itself a signal gesture of profound appreciation for the central role Oman played to facilitate the commencement of secret US-Iranian talks almost two years ago (without the knowledge of Saudi Arabia.)

Oman, of course, is a unique GCC country insofar as the sophistication with which it conducts international diplomacy has been a moveable feast (to the mind and intellect) in the Arab world and to analysts abroad. Again, Oman is a Muslim country that stands tall above the Sunni-Shi’ite sectarianism insofar as three-fourths of all Omanis belong to the Ibadaya sect, which is neither Sunni nor Shi’ite but closer to the latter.

This ‘population sociology’ anchored Oman historically more to the Persian world than to the interior of the Arabian Peninsula and makes the co-existence of the various sects critically important for Oman’s progress and well-being. Unsurprisingly, Oman has resisted repeated attempts by Saudi Arabia to rally the GCC states under its banner as its vassals – including the current attempt to rope in Oman to join the Saudi-led coalition to intervene in Yemen (as also the proposal to form an ‘Arab force’.)

Most important from the Iranian point of view has been Oman’s longstanding good neighborly policy toward Tehran and the friendly exchanges across the Strait of Hormuz, as manifest in its dexterity and consistency to spurn the Saudi policies riveted on a Sunni-Shi’ite confessional fracture borne out of extreme antagonism toward Iran.

Suffice it to say, it gratifies Tehran that Oman’s vision is positive in terms of regional stability by aiming at the reintegration of the Islamic Republic into the region.

Indeed, Oman had already positioned itself in the past as a “conduit” between Yemen’s Houthis and their Saudi foes and now hopes to be play a supporting role to help the United Nations bring the antagonists to a “roundtable” monitored by the Security Council. The Omani foreign minister Yusuf bin Alawi bin Abdullah was quoted as saying a week ago to Reuters, “The U.N. is an organization that has been tasked to maintain peace for all the powers involved, although we will not hesitate to play a role in order to help Yemenis, to help the United Nations, to encourage both parties involved in the crisis to come to a roundtable and discuss their own future.”

Now, this is a position that corresponds to Iran’s thinking — and Russia’s — and Zarif obviously hoped to build on it. During the talks in Muscat on Wednesday between Alawi and Zarif, Oman reiterated its stance and went a step ahead to call for a short truce to facilitate dispatch of humanitarian relief to the people of Yemen. (On the previous Saturday, Russia also tabled a resolution in the UN Security Council calling for “regular and mandatory humanitarian pauses” in the fighting, which Saudis rejected off the cuff but may eventually have to agree to.)

From Oman, Zarif crossed over to Pakistan the same day. Having secured a common position until then with Turkey and Oman, Tehran has an added interest to explore developing common ground with Islamabad because of Pakistan’s crucial importance to the future trajectory of the Yemen crisis.

Aside being a major Sunni Muslim country and strategically located, Pakistan is a traditional ally of Saudi Arabia. Most important, Pakistan is today head and shoulders above any other Muslim country as a military power (not only in the Gulf region and the entire Middle East but also in the Muslim world as a whole).

Given these compelling attributes, Tehran would estimate that it is not going to be possible for Saudi Arabia to sustain its military campaign relentlessly in Yemen if Pakistan does not move into the Saudi-led coalition as a lead participant. Specifically, a ground operation inside Yemen (which has an extremely difficult terrain comparable to Afghanistan) becomes simply out of the question unless Pakistani military participates in it and is willing to spearhead it.

How did Zarif’s discussions in Islamabad fare? The reports so far indicate that Pakistan may finally choose to opt out of a military intervention in Yemen. (here, here and here).

Hopefully, good sense will prevail in Islamabad. The point is, the Pakistani opinion strongly militates against the country intervening in the Yemen crisis. Secondly, the stance taken by countries such as Turkey, Russia and China is bound to influence the Pakistani thinking. (See my piece in Asia Times titled ‘Pakistan’s all-weather friend counsels caution’.) Finally, dispassionately speaking, it really hurts Pakistan’s core interests to fuel Sunni-Shi’ite sectarian strife in the region or to antagonize Iran.

Zarif is due to meet Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif today in Islamabad and the outcome of the meeting will have a huge bearing on the future developments in Yemen. If Pakistan and Iran appear on the same page along with Turkey and Oman, that will mean that the clock has begun ticking for Saudi Arabia to wind up its misadventure in Yemen and allow the start of intra-Yemeni negotiations under the UN auspices leading to power-sharing between the Youthis and the other protagonists who took to the centre stage in the downstream of the Arab Spring in 2011.

Once again, we are seeing a brilliant display of Iranian diplomacy. Tehran hopes to beat back the Saudi brinkmanship through diplomacy and rubbish Riyadh’s attempt to give the coloring of a Sunni-Shi’ite strife to the crisis in Yemen, which is at its core the question of that country’s democratic transformation in an inclusive spirit of accommodation.

If Tehran succeeds in this enterprise on the diplomatic track, ironically, the Yemen crisis may even help Iran to take a leap forward toward its own integration in the Persian Gulf region in the downstream of its nuclear deal with the world powers. Alas, the Obama administration is yet to fully grasp that the U.S. and Iran have a convergence of interests over stabilizing Yemen and a strengthening of the politics of consensus in the Persian Gulf region.