In the past seven years, Yemen has experienced immense human suffering, war, and destruction. Since the final and violent collapse of Yemen’s transitional process, ongoing cycles of violence have taken a huge toll on the life of Yemenis, damaging state institutions and the economy, and creating seemingly intractable social divisions.
Given the contested nature of public institutions, civil society organizations across the country have taken the responsibility to ensure the delivery of various basic services, and encourage inclusion and greater civic participation.
Civic solidarity and activism, particularly at the local level, have made Yemen an example of remarkable civic progress in the region. Young people have especially shown resilience to cope with difficult circumstances and transform in positive ways their communities.
However, structural obstacles prevent civil society actors from unfolding their full potential as change agents, hindering their activities from percolating up to the Track 1 level. The war’s fragmentary nature has significantly undermined coordination among CSOs, limiting their capacity to develop evidence-based research necessary to shape and sustain peace efforts and, thus, limiting the capacity of Yemenis to identify and shape solutions to the conflict.
Interpeace aims to support the inclusion of more diverse community-level actors to inform peacebuilding strategies and practices in Aden and Taiz.
Over a decade of conflict has taken an enormous toll on the lives of Yemenis, destroying infrastructure, damaging state institutions and the economy, and creating seemingly intractable social divisions. Given the contested nature of public institutions, civil society organisations across the country have taken on the responsibility of ensuring the delivery of various basic services and encouraging inclusion and greater civic participation. Young people have shown especially remarkable resilience in coping with difficult circumstances and positively transforming their communities.
In 2024, Interpeace and its partners worked towards including young people, women, and marginalised groups in political, social, and economic life, shaping the country’s economic recovery and transition towards peace. Youth initiatives were supported by capacity building and research to generate evidence on community resilience and youth vision for peacebuilding in Yemen. Networks between CSOs and Youth Initiatives were nurtured to channel youth voices towards Track 2 initiatives.
Interpeace engaged with partners to integrate a cross-sectoral approach to their work in conflict-affected communities, allowing them to meet the mental health and livelihood needs of people affected by violence to support dialogue and create conditions for reconciliation. This included strengthened research, conflict analysis, conflict resolution, and the advocacy capacities of two selected CSOs from Aden and Taiz, using Interpeace’s unique framework for assessing resilience.
2024 marked the phasing out of Interpeace activities in Yemen. Efforts are ongoing to secure additional funding to continue supporting some of the local partners that continue to advance peace through the aforementioned pillars of work.