Tawakkol Karman talks tough

Yemeni Nobel peace laureate Tawakkol Karman has called on the British government to freeze the assets of Yemen's president Ali Abdullah Saleh, during a visit to London. Speaking shortly after meeting with UK Foreign Secretary William Hague and Development Minister Alan Duncan, Karman made a passionate plea to a meeting of parliamentarians and NGOs that the assets of the regime, stolen from the Yemeni people, should be frozen. “The regime has used the fear of Al-Qaeda and instability to steal money from the international community.” “To the British people, I say, we don’t want your aid, we don’t want your taxes. We want our own money,” she said after the meeting in the Houses of Parliament. She also called on the United Nations Security Council to refer the killing of protestors to the International Criminal Court. Tawakkol also promised to return to her protest tent when she returned to Yemen's capital Sanaa, despite fears for her safety. “I give you the voice of women in the street. And of democracy in the street,” she said. “What we started in our country is for all of us.” Karman also said her country could be pushed into a civil war unless the West stopped supporting the current transition and took strong legal and financial action against Saleh. Karman said she told Hague that the current 90-day waiting period, between Saleh’s resignation and his departure from office, was "a very dangerous time". She told reporters she and her fellow-activists rejected the deal negotiated by the Gulf Cooperation Council, and she told the foreign secretary that Britain and the West should stop supporting it. “Three months is a long time. It means, enter Yemen to civil war. And I warn you because you are silent, you encourage him by your silence to do that,” she said. Karman, who received the Nobel Peace Prize on Saturday in Oslo, came to London to meet with officials and members of the Yemeni exile community, and to promote her cause through a series of public events. At a news conference at the Council for Arab-British Understanding, she called on Britain and other western governments to freeze the assets of Saleh and his supporters, to prosecute Saleh through the International Criminal Court and to launch an investigation of the Saleh regime, as called for in a UN Security Council resolution passed in October. “Britain’s government, they have to take their responsibility. And they have to be clever, not stupid. Please don’t play with Ali Saleh. Don’t give him a chance to cheat you more and more and more,” said Karman. Karman said Foreign Secretary Hague told her Britain wants to wait and see how Saleh behaves during the 90-day transition period. But Karman told him Saleh is already not doing what he is supposed to do. And she called on Britain to “re-examine” its position. She also criticised the Gulf plan, saying it gives Saleh immunity he doesn’t deserve, calls on the demonstrators to leave their encampment in Sanaa, and will create a paralysed transitional government and an undemocratic election with only one candidate. That candidate is to be Vice President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi, who Karman calls a puppet of Saleh. “Is this the democracy that we are struggling for, that we paid thousands of blood, killed people and injured in the street for this? Where is the accountability? For giving him the immunity, where is the democracy? One candidate, which is Abdrabuh Mansur Hadi, where is the press freedom and the human rights? Taking the demonstrations out, what is that? So, yes we are against that and we are not part of this initiative,” she said. Karman said the demonstrations would continue to protest the transition plan. She is the first Arab woman and, at age 32, the youngest person ever to win the Nobel Peace Prize. She received it along with Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf and Liberian activist Leymah Gbowee. Karman, founder of Women Journalists without Chains, was at the forefront of pro-democracy protests in her native Yemen. She is also the first Arab woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize in its 110 year history.   Hague later said in a press statement: “It is particularly fitting that, in a year of change cross the Middle East and North Africa, someone so passionate about the rights and freedoms we take for granted should be given this honour. "I welcomed Ms Karman’s call for all Yemenis, both men and women, to unite to create a democratic society free from corruption and violence and based on the rule of law.”