Word: noman
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Peace hopes in Yemen never last very long. Two months ago, when moderate Republican Ahmed Mohammed Noman took over as Premier of the rugged desert land, hopes had risen that the three-year-old civil war might finally be brought to an end. Noman shoved pro-Nasser President Abdullah Sallal into the background, kicked the military fanatics out of his Cabinet and surrounded himself with civilians. Then he sat down to hammer out a preliminary formula for peace...
White-haired Premier Noman, 60, believes in the republic but believes even more in compromise. Widely respected, and with friends in both camps, Noman is undoubtedly the man with the best chance yet of uniting Yemen. His first act was to name a new 15-man Cabinet remarkable for its even balance between Yemen's two main tribal groupings, the dominant mountain Zeidis, who are mostly royalist, and the Shafis, who are mostly republican. Another hopeful sign is that only two ministers are army officers and the rest civilians, including six who attended schools in the U.S., France...
...Noman spoke to the nation last week over Radio San'a, offering the hand of reconciliation and issuing a blanket invitation to "all tribes of all persuasions" to meet with him this week at Khamir, 50 miles north of San'a, in order to achieve "the one thing which we all prize over anything else: peace for the nation...
Overbearing Allies. Noman's peace drive obviously has the tacit blessing of Nasser, who is pained by the $500,000-a-day drain and the occupation of the Egyptian army in a bloody and endless war. In fact, everyone is fed up. The royalist tribes have had their villages bombed to rubble and lost an estimated 40,000 dead. The republican tribes resent their overbearing Egyptian allies, and are discouraged by lack of success in the field. Saudi Arabia's King Feisal, who backs the Imam, would be happy to see the Egyptians leave Yemen...
...week's end there was still no response from the royalist side. Undismayed, Noman continued his gentle pressure on the combatants, trying to establish some unity on the fractured republican side, holding out the carrot of Egyptian troop withdrawals to the royalists. As an added inducement to lure the Imam out of his cave and to the conference, Noman announced that he personally would head the republican delegation at Khamir-leaving the hated President Sallal behind...