Jamal Benomar

Benomar warned that Yemen’s conflict could become an “Iraq-Libya-Syria” scenario if either side pushes for control of the country, prompting the U.N. Security Council to threaten further measures if the hostilities do not end. “It would be an illusion to think that the Houthis could mount an offensive and succeed in taking control of the entire country. It would be equally false to think that President Hadi could assemble sufficient forces to liberate the country from the Houthis. Any side that would want to push the country in either direction would be inviting a protracted conflict in the vein of an Iraq-Libya-Syria combined scenario,” he said https://www.reuters.com/article/us-yemen-security-un-mediator/u-n-says-yemen-conflict-could-become-iraq-libya-syria-scenario-idUSKBN0MI0SG20150322. The statement sparked outrage among the Saudis and their Gulf allies, who poured scorn on Benomar in the Arabic-speaking media.

On 9 November 2015, Benomar was appointed as the UN Secretary-General's Special Adviser for Conflict Prevention. In that role he led the UN response to the political crisis in Burundi.

The talks were close to a conclusion, when on March 25, 2015, the Saudis intervened militarily. Less than a month later, Benomar resigned. In a statement delivered to the press following his final briefing on Yemen to the Security Council, Benomar condemned "systematic acts of obstruction" and warned against "interference and coercion from outside forces". "I stressed [to the Security Council] that getting the political process back on track and achieving lasting peace and stability in Yemen could only be reached through Yemeni-led peaceful negotiations, where Yemenis could determine their future," he said.

After eight months in a secret detention centre in Casablanca, Benomar was finally charged—with conspiracy to overthrow the government, threatening state security, and membership of illegal organisations—and moved to a regular jail.

He has been described as "quintessentially political" by the head of the Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue, David Harland, who has worked closely with Benomar. "He is not a simple man who is willing to put all of his cards on the table," Harland told the Atlantic Council in 2014.

In Yemen, Benomar served for four years as the UN Secretary-General's Special Envoy. Benomar led the Office of the Special Envoy of the Secretary-General for Yemen, where he worked "to facilitate the combined efforts of the international community to promote a democratic transition in the country". Benomar brokered the country's Transition Agreement in November 2011, facilitated the successful conclusion of the National Dialogue Conference in January 2014, which took 10 months of deliberations, and mediated the Peace and National Partnership Agreement in September 2014. Benomar facilitated a new round of negotiations, in February and March.

His work has largely focused on peacebuilding and governance issues in conflict countries. In 2005 he helped to establish the United Nations Peacebuilding Commission and Peacebuilding Support Office, which he also directed. He has advised on conflict resolution issues in over 30 countries, including Yemen, Afghanistan and Iraq, where in 2004 he served as the Secretary-General's Envoy to support the National Dialogue Conference.

"I just 'disappeared'," he told the New Internationalist in 1986. "That night I was tortured from midnight to 5 o'clock in the morning. They used the classical methods: binding the hands and feet of my naked body to an iron bar and whipping the soles of my feet while forcing my head back in a bucket of excrement."

Escaping house arrest in 1984, he fled Morocco on a fisherman's boat and flew from Spain to the UK, where he was granted political asylum, Benomar continued his studies at the Sorbonne and completed his doctorate at the University of London. He went on to become a lecturer and research associate in African and Middle Eastern politics at the University of Paris VII, and worked as an Africa specialist for Amnesty International in London.

During his time in prison, Benomar earned a bachelor's degree and two master's degrees from the Sorbonne in Paris. Following Amnesty's efforts and interventions by his professor in Paris, he was released in 1983, re-arrested soon after and then re-released in 1984, but placed under house arrest.

Jamal Benomar (Arabic: جمال بنعمر ‎; born c. April 1957) is a former UN diplomat. He worked at the UN for 25 years, including as a special envoy for Yemen and a special adviser to former Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.

Benomar was born in April 1957 in Nador, north of Morocco. At 19, as a political activist known for his peaceful opposition to the government, he was arrested and imprisoned for eight years.