The UN envoy for Yemen, Hans Grundberg, on Tuesday pushed Yemen’s Houthi rebels to keep the country’s fragile truce alive by helping to reopen roads into the south-western city of Taez.
Yemen’s government backs UN plans to reopen the Habwan route into the government-held city, but the Houthis, who see the road as a front line in the war, are dragging their feet, he said.
The closed roads into Taez and other cities have become a sticking point in talks on an April 1 truce between Yemen's warring parties, which raised hopes of an end to years of death and destruction.
“While I am encouraged by the positive response by the government of Yemen to the United Nations proposal, I am still waiting for a response from Ansar Allah,” said Mr Grundberg, using the Houthis’ official name.
“Following the constructive discussions I had in [Yemen’s Houthi-held capital] Sanaa at the end of last week, I urge Ansar Allah to respond positively without delay to the United Nations proposals.”
The UN plan for reopening roads involves ensuring civilians can use the routes safely. The Houthis reportedly say they cannot move their forces from a front-line position outside the government-held city.
Mr Grundberg says the “long and arduous” mountain route from Sanaa to Taez takes twice as long as the more direct but closed three-hour main road.
Poor access to the city has “crippled the economy” and denied some locals access to medical care, he said.
The hold-up has exposed “the fragility of the truce” between the rebels and the government, which was extended on June 2, said Mr Grundberg, and “delays to implementation might threaten to unravel it in its entirety”.
“Resorting to transactionalism, threatening to condition the implementation of one element of the truce against another, and using escalatory media rhetoric undermines the truce,” he told the UN Security Council in New York.
Council members met amid signs of diplomatic progress in the region, with Houthi officials and Saudi Arabia, which backs Yemen’s government, reportedly resuming direct talks over a potential peace and security deal along the kingdom’s border.
The so far sporadic negotiations between senior Saudi and Houthi officials resumed last month before the scheduled renewal of a UN-brokered truce, Reuters reported. They were enabled by Oman and could lead to a face-to-face meeting in Muscat.
US President Joe Biden has also announced plans to meet Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman next month, indicating an effort to bolster ties with Riyadh that have grown strained since Mr Biden came into office.
The Houthis seized control of Sanaa in 2014, prompting a Saudi-led military intervention to support the government the following year.
The war has led to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people and left millions hungry and destitute.
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Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
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