TWITTER POLL: The vast majority do not agree with the US decision to remove Houthis from the terrorist list
DUBAI: A large majority of respondents to an Arab News Twitter poll said they disagreed with the U.S. decision to remove the Houthi militia from a terrorism list – one of Donald Trump’s final decisions before leaving to rescind the office.
A staggering 74 percent of the 1,113 voters spoke out against the decision, a little more than 17 percent agreed. And only 8.9 percent said they were undecided.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the Houthis would be removed from the U.S. list of foreign terrorist organizations on February 16.
Blinken said the decision to remove the group’s FTO designation as well as the specifically designated global terrorist designation was due to concerns, calling it “an acknowledgment of the dire humanitarian situation in Yemen.”
The announcement came after the Houthis launched a series of attacks on civilian targets in Saudi Arabia condemned by the State Department earlier this week.
The leading US diplomat stated in his statement that the Houthi leaders Abdul Malik Al-Houthi, Abd Al-Khaliq Badr Al-Din Al-Houthi and Abdullah Yahya Al-Hakim remain under sanctions.
#POLL: Do you agree with the decision of the Biden administration to outclass Houthis as a terrorist group?
– Arab News (@arabnews) February 13, 2021
“The United States continues to have clear eyes for Ansarallah’s malicious actions and aggression, including the forcible takeover of large areas in Yemen, the attack on US partners in the Gulf, the kidnapping and torture of US citizens and many of our allies, and the diversion of humanitarian aid Help Aid, brutal suppression of the Yemenis in the areas they control and the deadly attack on December 30, 2020 in Aden against the cabinet of the legitimate government of Yemen, ”he said, using a different name for the Houthis.
The Biden government’s special envoy to Yemen, Timothy Lenderking, was in Riyadh this week to meet with Saudi and Yemeni officials as well as UN special envoy Martin Griffiths.
“The United States, along with the United Nations and others, will redouble its efforts to end the war itself. We reaffirm our firm conviction that there is no military solution to this conflict, ”said Blinken on Friday.
