Expert Roundtable
The Biden Administration and the War in Yemen: Pathways to Peace?
Event Description
The Public International Law & Policy Group held a roundtable discussion with key experts on the war in Yemen to discuss recent developments and insights on the future of the peace process in the context of a new U.S. administration.
Within his first month in office, President Biden announced three decisions that significantly reshape U.S. foreign policy towards Saudi Arabia and the role of the U.S. military in Yemen’s protracted and complex civil war. With the announcement ending offensive U.S. support for the Saudi-led coalition’s military campaign in Yemen, his appointment of career Foreign Service Officer Timothy Lenderking as special envoy to Yemen, and the removal of foreign terrorist organization (FTO) designation on the Houthis, President Biden appears to hold strong intentions to alter the U.S.’s approach to ending the war that has produced the worst humanitarian crisis in modern history.
Our panelists provided insights into the current complexities within the Yemen conflict, opportunities and challenges for U.S. engagement (or lack thereof), and what will likely come from Biden’s announcements as the new administration pursues a sustainable peace for the nearly six year conflict.
This event was part of the PILPG Thought Leadership Initiative. The Initiative focuses on prominent international law and international affairs topics and organizes monthly expert roundtables to share expertise and reflections from our work on peace negotiations, post-conflict constitution drafting, and war crimes prosecution.
MODERATOR
Professor Milena Sterio
Milena Sterio, the Charles R. Emrick Jr. - Calfee Halter & Griswold Professor of Law at Cleveland State University’s Cleveland-Marshall College of Law and Co-Coordinator for Global Criminal Justice Partnerships at the PILPG is a leading expert on international law, international criminal law and human rights. Sterio is one of six permanent editors of the prestigious IntLawGrrls blog, and a frequent contributor to the blog focused on international law, policy and practice. In the spring of 2013, Sterio was selected as a Fulbright Scholar, spending the semester in Baku, Azerbaijan, at Baku State University. While in Baku, she had the opportunity to teach and conduct research on secession issues under international law related to the province of Azerbaijan, Nagorno-Karabakh. Serving as a maritime piracy law expert, she has participated in meetings of the United Nations Contact Group on Piracy off the Coast of Somalia as well as in the work of the United Nations Global Counterterrorism Forum. Sterio has also assisted piracy prosecutions in Mauritius, Kenya and the Seychelles Islands. Sterio is a graduate of Cornell Law School and the University of Paris I, and was an associate in the New York City firm of Cleary, Gottlieb, Steen & Hamilton before joining the ranks of academia full time. She has published seven books and numerous law review articles. Her latest book, “The Syrian Conflict’s Impact on International Law,” (co-authored with Paul Williams and Michael Scharf) was published by Cambridge University Press in 2020.
Speakers
Peter Salisbury
Peter is a Senior Analyst for Yemen at the International Crisis Group. Peter has more than a decade of wide-ranging experience as a print, online and broadcast journalist. The former energy editor of MEED, the Middle East Economic Digest, he has written for the Economist, the Financial Times, Foreign Policy, and Vice News among others. He has consulted to the UK’s Department of International Development, the UN, and The World Bank, and has published a series of highly regarded papers on Yemen for Chatham House, the London-headquartered think tank where he is also a Senior Consulting Fellow. He has also produced a number of short- and long-format documentaries on Yemen for VICE, a youth-oriented media network. In 2018, he won a Canadian Screen Award for his work on the VICE television series, TERROR. Peter appears regularly on television, radio and in print as a commentator on Middle East affairs.
A. Heather Coyne
A. Heather leads the Senior Security Sector Reform team for the UN Special Envoy for Yemen, designing options for transitional security arrangements that integrate civilian protection mechanisms. She previously served in UN missions in Somalia and Afghanistan, building the capacity of security agencies and strengthening civil society to make those institutions more accountable and responsive to their citizens. Before joining the UN, she worked for the US Institute of Peace and as a civil servant in the U.S. government.
In her last mission, A. Heather worked on SSR with the Rule of Law and Security Institutions Group of the UN Assistance Mission in Somalia for two years, where she focused on building capacity of the security agencies to oversee the armed forces, manage weapons and regulate the private security industry, and conduct public outreach. Before that, she was the acting Senior Police Advisor for the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan, working to empower civil society to make police more accountable to their citizens. Coyne had previously served a two-year military tour with the NATO Training Mission to strengthen the role of civil society in shaping the training and reform of the Afghan police and army.
Raiman al-Hamdani
Raiman al-Hamdani is a researcher for the Yemen Policy Center and ARK Group, and a a visiting fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations. Hamdani’s research and professional work is orientated around issues of security, stabilisation and development in the Middle East and North Africa. He has volunteered at schools for disabled children, worked in camps for internally displaced persons, and represented Yemen at the UN Department of Peacekeeping Operations. Hamdani holds an MA in international security from the American University in Cairo and an MSc in development from SOAS University of London.
General George Macintosh
G A J Macintosh CBE, Welsh Guards
Brigadier Macintosh (Mac) has served on operations in Northern Ireland, the Balkans, Sierra Leone, Kuwait, Iraq and Afghanistan. On the staff he has been responsible for portfolios in Counter Terrorism, Operational Planning, and covert surveillance programmes. Brigadier Macintosh was posted to Jordan in 2014 to establish the Quick Reaction Force. Brigadier Macintosh has worked in most Middle Eastern Countries and has a passion for the region, its culture, politics and people. He is currently serving as the Special Envoy’s Military Advisor, charged with providing military advice and developing and implementing a Nationwide Ceasefire.