Alistair Burt; A British With Suspicious Relations to UAE is Awaiting the Appointment as the UN Envoy to Yemen
Media leaks revealed the possibility of appointing the British Alistair Birt as the special UN envoy to Yemen, after Martin Griffith, who holds the same nationality. On May 17, 2021, the Emirati newspaper, Al Bayan, spoke of the appointment of the former British Minister of State for Foreign Affairs for the Middle East and North Africa, Birt, as a special UN envoy to Yemen.
If Birt is appointed, he will be the fourth envoy since the outbreak of the Yemeni crisis in 2011, after the Moroccan Jamal Benomar, the Mauritanian Ismail Ould Cheikh, and the British Martin Griffiths. Media reported that the appointment of Birt comes after Saudi Arabia's opposition to the proposal to appoint the Omani Minister Yusuf bin Alawi, who had been serving as Minister of Foreign Affairs for several years. Although Birt was the one who supervised the Yemeni file within the Quartet Committee on Yemen (the United States, Britain, Saudi Arabia, and the Emirates), through his position as Minister of State for Middle East and North Africa Affairs, many "do not rely on him" to solve the crisis.
Many believe that Birt's "expected" period will be similar to that of Griffiths, in addition to the concern of some about his lack of neutrality, given the good relationship that he has with the Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi, Mohammed Bin Zayed.
A Friend of the Emirates
Birt has a strong relationship with the UAE, and he is considered as one of the personalities that is close to Bin Zayed. In 2018, the British "Spin Watch" organization concerned with following up on political corruption cases published a report entitled "The UAE is sabotaging democracy in Britain", in which it accused Abu Dhabi of supporting counter-revolutions in the Arab Spring countries to prevent the spread of democracy in the Gulf and the Middle East. In parts of the report, the organization said, "Birt, the man close to Bin Zayed, heads the parliamentary lobby concerned with the Emirates and seeks through them to influence the parliament and support a number of British House of Commons members, in order to pass UAE policies in the council."
According to Spin Watch, it has obtained "very interesting" emails recently leaked by "Cuellar Consultants", a major institution the UAE used to conduct lobbying activities in London during the Arab Spring. The organization revealed the names of personalities in the British Parliament working to serve the interests of the Emirates and pass theirs and said that the personalities are prepared and provided with information and instructions by ministers in the Emirates and even the visits are paid by the office of Bin Zayed.
It added, "This is taking place with the participation of the parliamentary group representing all parties, including some current and former ministers, including Birt, who was known for his public adoption of the Emirati positions within the government when he was acting as the Undersecretary of State for Parliamentary Affairs in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs between 2010 and 2013." Moreover, Birt is the honorary president of the Emirates Society in the United Kingdom, and the British academic and researcher, Christian Ritcheson, had questioned if Birt would resign from the position of Honorary President of the Emirates Society in the United Kingdom, in case the United Nations officially appointed him.
It is worth noting that Birt was a former member of "Friends of Israel" in the Conservative Party, and in 2008 he led a campaign to visit the Israeli hostage, Gilad Shalit, who was captured by Hamas in 2006 and released in 2011 in a prisoner exchange deal.
Very Active
Birt was born on May 25, 1955 in the city of Bury, in the county of Lancashire, northwest of England, and received his education at Bury Grammar School, then studied law at St. John's College of the University of Oxford, and graduated in 1977, and about a year before his graduation he was elected the President of the "Oxford Law" . He began his life as a writer for "Slater Hills" in Manchester in 1978, and soon became a lawyer with "Watts Valence" law firm, and worked there from 1980 until 1983. Birt joined the Conservative Party at an early age, when he was 27 years old, he was elected to the Council of Haringey Borough, but he left after about two years, to win a seat in the constituency of Bury North In the general election in Manchester, until 1997.
He was also elected again in 2001 to become a Member of Parliament for East Bedfordshire until 2019. During his membership in Parliament, he held several positions and was active , so he was appointed as an Undersecretary of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Parliament, then Minister of State in the Ministry of Social Security from 1992 to 1997, and an agent in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Commonwealth from 2010 to 2013, and he was also appointed Minister of State at the Ministry of Health from May 2015 until July 2016. In 2005, Birt was appointed as the spokesperson for local government affairs, and in 2008 he was promoted to Assistant to the President and Vice President of the Conservative Party in charge of internal development.
Middle East Expert
Bert is an expert on Middle East issues, as he has held the position of Minister of State at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Member of the British Parliament for Middle East and North Africa Affairs since 2017, and was the first joint Minister of State in the Middle East and North Africa for both the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Department for International Development. Birt has also been one of the supervisors of the Yemeni file since assuming his position as Minister of State for Middle East and North Africa Affairs, and he has close ties with Yemeni officials and politicians and their counterparts in the region. And if he is appointed, his first task is to continue working on finding a ceasefire plan, which was proposed by his predecessor Griffiths to bring peace to Yemen, in which he admitted that he “failed” to do so.
