Alex Christoforou
The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of this site. This site does not give financial, investment or medical advice.
The Duran’s Alex Christoforou and Editor-in-Chief Alexander Mercouris discuss how Saudi Crown Prince MbS has been defeated in on all fronts from a disastrous oil price war to the failed war in Yemen.
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As the coronavirus continues its assault on members of the Saudi royal family, the rulers of the Kingdom on Wednesday called off its assault on Yemen.
The unilateral ceasefire will begin at noon on Thursday, Saudi time, and is to last at least two weeks. Its stated intention is to prevent an outbreak of the virus in Yemen. Under no existing modeling can a coronavirus outbreak be defeated in two weeks.
Senior members of the royal family, including 84-year old King Salman, and the effective ruler, Muhammad bin Salman, have retreated to an island off the coast of Jeddah in the Red Sea.
Prince Faisal bin Bandar bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, the powerful governor of Riyadh who is a nephew to the king, is stricken with the disease and is in intensive care, The New York Times reported, citing two doctors “with ties” to King Faisal Hospital and two other sources near to the royal family.
In all, 150 members of the ruling family are reported to have been infected. The Saudi government officially said it is seeking the ceasefire because of its fear that the virus could spread in Yemen, where there are still no reported cases. There are 3,287 cases in Saudi Arabia, with 44 deaths and 2,577 cases still unresolved.
The Times reported that Saudi officials want the ceasefire to “jump-start” UN brokered peace talks to end the war. Joining in the ceasefire would be the nations of the Saudi-led coalition as well as the Yemeni government in exile in the Saudi capital, the Times reported. Coalition spokesman Col. Turki al-Malki said that peace talks would be held “under the supervision of the UN envoy to discuss his proposals on the steps and mechanisms to implement a permanent ceasefire in Yemen.” Al-Malki said the ceasefire could be extended to facilitate “a comprehensive political solution in Yemen.”
The coalition further said in a statement:
“On the occasion of holding and succeeding the efforts of the UN envoy to Yemen and to alleviate the suffering of the brotherly Yemeni people and work to confront the corona pandemic and prevent it from spreading, the coalition announces a comprehensive ceasefire for a period of two weeks, starting on Thursday.”
Mohammed Ali al-Houthi, a top Houthi official, tweeted an eight-page plan to end the war before the Saudi announcement. The Houthis control the Yemeni capital Sanaa. After the truce was to go into effect on Thursday, a Houthi spokesman claimed Saudi attacks continued. “The Saudis are still employing their air, land and naval forces to tighten the siege on Yemen … this is an announcement only to restore (their positions), to close ranks,” said Mohammed al-Bukhaiti.
The unilateral ceasefire could end a vicious five-year campaign by the richest nation in the Middle East against the poorest. It began on March 26, 2015 just as the UN was close to brokering a deal to end the political standoff, as the then UN envoy to Yemen told me at the time.
Martin Griffiths, the current UN envoy, said in a statement: “The parties must now utilize this opportunity and cease immediately all hostilities with the utmost urgency.”
The BBC reported that the two sides would communicate in a video conference to discuss the ceasefire. “The proposal calls for the halting of all air, ground and naval hostilities,” the British national broadcaster said.
U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Thursday urged Houthis to “respond in kind to the coalition’s initiative.” The United States has backed the Saudi war with logistical and material support.
It is in the Saudis’ interests to stop a coronavirus outbreak in Yemen. Riyadh is spending $200 million a day on the war, with oil having fallen to below $30 a barrel. They have allied jihadis, and almost certainly intelligence agents operating inside Yemen, and Yemenis can find their way across the frontier. On Wednesday, Yemen sealed its last remaining border crossing with Saudi Arabia to prevent a spread of the virus.
An end to the conflict would come as UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres has called for a global ceasefire, in which he said some 70 nations have already signed on. Saudi Arabia would appear on Wednesday to have joined that list.
Joe Lauria is editor-in-chief of Consortium News and a former correspondent for The Wall Street Journal, Boston Globe, Sunday Times of London and numerous other newspapers. He can be reached at joelauria@consortiumnews.com and followed on Twitter @unjoe .
The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of this site. This site does not give financial, investment or medical advice.
What is the point in commenting when The Duran deletes/censors comments…
Yes, someone is creating havoc on this page. Has the Duran site been hacked? All comments on several articles were deleted. The count numbers were deleted. And plenty of dumb stuff nobody wants to read has been placed in. Who – for heaven’s sake – is doing this? Where is the editor, Alex Christoforou?
The Duran has mentioned several times when Alex is encouraging people to donate at the end of video discussions that there are efforts to “demonetize” the site. At one point I heard words to the effect that You Tube was interfering in some way, and would remove videos if certain names or issues were mentioned. The same kind of thing happened to Information Clearing House News (ICH). “Someone” in the US stopped companies from hosting ICH so they had to find a provider off shore. It’s all part of an attempt to deny our right to free speech and access… Read more »
But this site is separate from the videos. YouTube has no access to the articles on this site of THE DURAN. It was someone else who deleted the vote count and all of the comments on about 4 to 5 texts here. I wonder who did this. Pure censorship! Phui!
It’s almost certainly not The Duran that is doing this. Subscribe to The Duran on Bitchute, and you can watch and comment on the same videos there. So far, I have seen no censorship or interference on Bitchute.
Clarity and I do not refer to the videos on youtube or bitchute. We are refering to this site of texts, THE DURAN. There was severe censorship on 4 to 5 texts here, amongst others the text about how Konev’s statue was treated badly in Prague. All of the comments (about ten comments) are deleted.
The Duran could probably save comments and reload them if they are taken down by who-knows-who. Do you think that Alex and Alexander are aware that this is occurring? I suppose that they must read comments when they post videos and articles, but perhaps they do not go back to check comments on previous posts.
That’ s right. Who-knows-who deletes comments and vote counts, going more or less unchecked by Alex and Alexander who are very busy preparing their videos. Probably Alex does not have the time to go back and check comments. He does all of the merchandise for the DURAN too. So who-knows-wo goes on rampage trips across the comments, when he feels like it ….
Trump can natter all he wants about another 10 million barrel cut but he’s just yapping to try to keep the price up. The reality is that this agreed to cut from what I last read doesn’t take effect until May 1st. Shale oil will bleed buckets (I guess barrels is a more apt term) of red ink and it doesn’t matter how much money Trump pumps into this money losing industry. When the storage is full, that’s when problems accelerate in the US. As for tankers (besides locking in relatively cheap floating storage which is also important) of Saudi… Read more »
Both MBS and Trump are arrogant narcissistic fools. They both lie through their teeth and behave like children having a tantrum when things don’t go their way. MBS imprisons or executes the opposition, and Trump fires it. Fracking companies were already in the red in the first quarter of 2019. https://ieefa.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Red-Ink-Keeps-Flowing-for-US-Fracking-Sector_June-2019.pdf “A cross-section of 29 fracking-focused oil and gas companies reported more than $2.5 billion in negative free cash flows in the first quarter of 2019. These results were even worse than in the fourth quarter of 2018, when the same group of fracking-focused enterprises notched $2.1 billion in negative… Read more »
Seems the oil storage came to a head even faster than I thought. So what is Trump going to do now…………….
PETROLEUM NEEDS UPGRADE, EASY TO TRACK AMONG OTHER INNOVATIONS.
OIL RESERVES… POOR COUNTRIES MUST UPGRADE OIL?
International meaning… oil – just many alternatives…