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WASHINGTON (AP) – President Joe Biden’s National Security Advisor, Jake Sullivan, travels to Saudi Arabia on Monday to meet with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman as the US attempts to bring the kingdom to a ceasefire in its year-long war against the kingdom Houthi rebels move in Yemen.
Sullivan will be the highest-ranking official in the Biden government to visit Saudi Arabia. In addition to visiting the Crown Prince, often referred to by his initials MBS, Sullivan is expected to meet with Deputy Secretary of Defense Khalid bin Salman, a brother of the Crown Prince, according to two senior administrative officials. The officers were not allowed to speak publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.
The Biden White House has largely stayed away from the Crown Prince since a CIA report was released in February showing that MBS likely approved the 2018 assassination of Washington Post columnist and Saudi critic Jamal Khashoggi at the Kingdom’s consulate in Istanbul Has.
But the White House has decided that ending what is perhaps the most complex conflict in the world cannot be done without face-to-face meetings with the most senior Saudi officials, a senior administration official said.
National Security Council spokeswoman Emily Horne said Sullivan was traveling to Riyadh on Monday and would also visit the United Arab Emirates, a Saudi ally in the war, but did not provide any further details.
Sullivan is deployed at a time when the situation in Yemen, the poorest country in the Arab world, is deteriorating. Fighting in the key city of Marib has intensified as Iran-backed rebels attempted to oust the Saudi-backed government from the oil-rich city in the north of the country.
The new UN special envoy for Yemen, Hans Grundberg, recently stated that the country is “in an indefinite state of war” and that resumption of negotiations to end the more than six-year conflict will not be easy.
The war in Yemen began in September 2014 when the Iran-backed Houthis captured Sanaa and marched south to try to take over the entire country. Saudi Arabia, along with the United Arab Emirates and other countries, entered the war on the side of the internationally recognized government of Yemen in March 2015.
The US sold bombs and fighter jets to Saudi Arabia, which the kingdom later used in attacks on Yemen that also killed civilians. In 2015, the Obama administration initially offered the US targeted support for Saudi Arabia’s command and control operations, which were intended to minimize civilian casualties in air strikes. That was not the case, and Obama ultimately cut the program.
Targeted aid continued under President Donald Trump, although his administration later suspended US refueling operations for Saudi jets.
Biden announced weeks in his administration that he would end all American support for “offensive operations in the war in Yemen, including relevant arms sales.” However, little progress has been made on the ground in resolving what the United Nations believes is the world’s worst humanitarian crisis.
White House officials hope Grundberg’s appointment will bring new momentum and pressure on all sides to end the conflict, according to two senior administrative officials.
Sullivan’s talks with the Saudis and the United Arab Emirates will be accompanied by US Special Envoy for Yemen Tim Lenderking and NSC Senior Director for the Middle East Brett McGurk. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin planned a trip to Saudi Arabia earlier this month while he was in the region but has been postponed due to scheduling issues.
The high-profile push by the White House comes after Lenderking traveled to Saudi Arabia and Oman, which pushed for an end to the war. In addition, Foreign Minister Antony Blinken held talks with his counterparts in the Gulf Cooperation Council on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly.
Sullivan’s visit to Saudi Arabia also comes as the government is looking for ways to revive the nuclear deal with Iran. The Saudis and the UAE vehemently oppose a return to the agreement with Iran originally negotiated by the Obama administration in 2015, only to be abandoned by Trump in 2018.
The new Iranian Foreign Minister Hossain Amir Abdollah said on Friday before the UN General Assembly that the country would “very soon” return to nuclear negotiations in Vienna. But he accused the Biden government of sending conflicting messages, saying it wanted to rejoin the pact while imposing new sanctions on Tehran and not taking “an iota of positive action.”
Biden and his team have made a US return to the deal – signed by Britain, France, Russia, China, Germany and Iran – one of their top foreign policy priorities. But the US has made limited progress on indirect talks, and Tehran has resisted the Biden administration’s call for a “longer and stronger” deal than the original, which expires in late 2030.
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