Defense Secretary Jim Mattis arrived in Saudi Arabia Tuesday and called for a brokered peace in the Saudi-led war against Houthi rebels in Yemen.
“It has gone on for a long time,” Mattis told reporters traveling with him before his plane landed at King Salman Air Base in Riyadh.
“Our goal, ladies and gentleman, is for that crisis down there, that ongoing fight, be put in front of a U.N.-brokered negotiating team and try to resolve this politically as soon as possible,” Mattis said, according to an official transcript released by the Pentagon.
Mattis said the U.S. stands solidly behind Saudi Arabia, which he noted has been a key security ally since 1944, when President Franklin Delano Roosevelt first opened a formal relationship with the Saudi king.
“They remain a pillar of our security framework for the region and for American interests,” Mattis said.
Mattis accused Iran of supplying the anti-government Houthi rebels with arms, including missiles that have been fired into Saudi Arabia.
The war, he says, has gone on too long.
“This is something, with the number of innocent people dying inside Yemen, that has simply got to brought to an end,” Mattis said. “So we will work with our allies, with our partners, to try to get it to the U.N.-brokered negotiating table.”
