UN welcomes decree to restructure security sector in Yemen

A senior United Nations official has welcomed the decrees adopted by Yemeni President Abdrabuh Mansour Hadi Mansour on Monday to restructure the country’s security sector. “The issuance of these decrees mark an important step in implementing Yemen’s November 2011 Transition Agreement,” said a statement issued by the Special Adviser of the Secretary-General on Yemen, Jamal Benomar, on Monday evening. Yemen has been undergoing a democratic transition, under the leadership of Mansour, who came to power in an election in February. This followed the Transition Agreement signed by warring factions in November 2011 on a transitional settlement in the wake of widespread protests similar to those seen across the Middle East and North Africa and the resignation of former president Ali Abdullah Saleh. The decrees will “create the necessary conditions and take the necessary steps to integrate the armed forces under unified, national and professional leadership in the context of the rule of law,” as set forth in the Agreement, Benomar said. An important element of the transition is an all-inclusive national dialogue, scheduled to take place later this year, and whose outcome will feed into the constitution-making process that is to conclude in late 2013, enabling general elections to take place in February 2014. Last month, the Government launched the preparatory process for the national dialogue conference, and in his statement, Benomar, who had just finished a two-week visit to the country, reiterated the UN’s support for the dialogue and other transition tasks. The Special Adviser indicated he supports these measures and “calls on all concerned to work together to ensure the effective implementation of these decrees, which are essential to promoting peace and stability in Yemen.”