ADEN, Yemen (AP) — Separatists in southern Yemen accused Saudi Arabia on Friday of targeting its forces with airstrikes, which the kingdom has not officially acknowledged, after it warned the forces to withdraw from governorates they recently seized.
The United Arab Emirates-backed Southern Transitional Council said the strikes took place in Yemen’s Hadramout governorate. It was not immediately clear if there were any casualties in the strikes, which are further raising tensions in the war-torn nation and endangering a fragile Saudi-led coalition that has been fighting Iran-backed Houthi rebels in the country’s north for a decade.
Amr Al Bidh, the council’s special representative for foreign affairs, said in a statement to The Associated Press that his fighters operated in eastern Hadramout on Friday after facing “many ambushes” by gunmen. Those attacks killed two Council fighters and wounded 12 others, Al Bidh said.
The Saudi airstrikes took place after that, he added.
The Council later described their operations in the area as searching for a wanted man and trying to stop smuggling through the area.
Saudi warnings precede strikes
Faez bin Omar, a leading member of a coalition of tribes in Hadramout, told the AP that he believed the strikes served as a warning to the Council to withdraw its fighters from the area. An eyewitness to the strikes, Ahmed al-Khed, said he then saw destroyed military vehicles believed to belong to Council-allied forces.
The Council’s satellite channel, AIC, aired what appeared to be cellphone footage it described as showing the strikes. In one video, a man speaking could be heard blaming the Saudi aircraft.
Saudi officials did not respond to a request for comment from the AP. However, Saudi-owned London newspaper Asharq Al-Awsat, citing “informed sources”, reported late Friday that the kingdom carried out the strikes “to send a message” to the Council.
“Any further escalation will be met with stricter measures,” the paper said.
On Thursday, the kingdom called on Emirati-backed separatists in southern Yemen to withdraw.
The council moved earlier this month to Yemen’s Hadramout and Mahra governorates. That pushed back forces affiliated with the Saudi-backed National Shield Forces, another group in the coalition fighting the Houthis.
Those aligned with the Council increasingly flew the flag of South Yemen, which was a separate country from 1967-1990. Demonstrators gathered in the southern port city of Aden on Thursday to support political forces calling for South Yemen to secede from Yemen again.
The Saudis and Emiratis support various forces in Yemen
After the Houthis captured Yemen’s capital Sanaa and much of the country’s north in 2014, Aden has been the seat of power for the internationally recognized government and forces aligned against the rebels.
The separatists’ actions have strained the relationship between Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, which have close ties and are members of the OPEC oil cartel but have also competed for influence and international business in recent years.
The United Arab Emirates said in a statement on Friday that it “welcomed the efforts undertaken by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to support security and stability” in Yemen.
“The UAE reaffirmed its firm commitment to support all efforts aimed at strengthening stability and development in Yemen, contributing positively to regional security and prosperity,” it added.
There has also been an escalation of violence in Sudan, another Red Sea nation, where the kingdom and the Emirates are backing opposing forces in that country’s ongoing war.
The war in Yemen
The Iran-backed Houthis seized Sanaa in September 2014 and forced the internationally recognized government into exile. Iran denies arming the rebels, although Iranian-made weapons have been found on the battlefield and in shipping bound for Yemen, despite a UN arms embargo.
A Saudi-led coalition, armed with American weapons and intelligence, went to war on the side of Yemen’s exiled government in March 2015. Years of inconclusive fighting have pushed the Arab world’s poorest nation to the brink of famine.
The war has killed more than 150,000 people, including combatants and civilians, and created one of the world’s worst humanitarian disasters, killing tens of thousands more.
Meanwhile, the Houthis have launched attacks on hundreds of ships in the Red Sea corridor due to the Israel-Hamas war, greatly disrupting regional shipping.
Further chaos in Yemen could draw the United States back.
Washington launched an intense bombing campaign against the rebels earlier this year, which US President Donald Trump halted just before his trip to the Middle East in October. The Biden administration has also conducted strikes against the Houthis, including using B-2 bombers to target what it described as underground bunkers used by the Houthis.
In a statement early Saturday, the US State Department said it was “grateful for the diplomatic leadership of our partners, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates,” in the crisis in Yemen.
“The United States is concerned about recent events in southeast Yemen,” it said. “We urge restraint and the continuation of diplomacy, with a view to reaching a lasting solution.”
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Gambrell reported from Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Associated Press writer Fatma Khaled in Cairo contributed to this report.