At least 20 separatist fighters were killed by airstrikes on Yemen on Friday as a Saudi-led coalition hit back at the United Arab Emirates (UAE)-backed Southern Transition Council, two days after UAE said that it would withdraw its forces from Saudi Arabia following the bombardment in Yemen’s Mukalla.
The fighters died in attacks on military bases in Al-Khasha and Seiyun, news agency AFP reported quoting an official for the Southern Transitional Council’s forces. Airstrikes carried out by Saudi-led coalition killed 20 UAE-backed Yemeni separatist fighters on Friday, a military official for the group said.
The strikes hit the airport and military base in Hadramout‘s Seiyun city on Friday, an STC source and witnesses said. The strikes have also hit airport operations with no planes have taken off or landed at Aden airport for more than 24 hours, although the ministry did not officially announce its closure.
The air raids came shortly after pro-Saudi forces launched a campaign to take control of military sites in Hadramout, ‘peacefully’.
This was the first time that coalition fires fell people since STC seized almost all provinces of Hadramout and Mahra, including oil facilities earlier in December.
The UAE said that it sought de-escalation after the strikes on Friday and that its last forces had left Yemen.
On Tuesday, UAE withdrew its forces from Yemen after Saudi Arabia bombed the port city of Mukalla, targeting a shipment that had arrived from UAE which allegedly carried weapons. UAE denied all claims stating that the shipment carried vehicles and not weapons of any sort.
A military spokesperson for STC said that the council was in a ‘decisive and existential war’ with the Saudi-backed forces in Yemen, calling it a fight against radical Islamism, a longtime preoccupation of the UAE.
Hadramout governor and leader of the province’s Saudi-backed local forces, Salem Al-Khanbashi said that the the operation was not a declaration of war.
“This operation does not target any political or social group,” he said, clarifying that it aims to peacefully and systematically hand over military sites.
Saudi sources confirmed the air strikes were carried out by the Saudi-led coalition, which also nominally includes the UAE and was formed in 2015 to fight the Iran-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen’s north.
A Saudi military source warned that the attacks would not stop unless the STC withdraws forces from the two governorates.
Rivalry
Although the political rivalry between Saudi Arabia and Yemen dates back to almost a decade ago, STC’s recent offensive left Riyadh angered and the oil-rich Gulf powers at loggerheads.
Foreign affairs representative for the STC, Amr Al Bidh accused Riyadh of having “knowingly misled the international community by announcing a ‘peaceful operation’ that they never had any intention to keep peaceful”.
“This was evidenced by the fact that they launched 7 airstrikes minutes later,” Bidh posted on X.
Opposite STC stands the Yemeni military which is allied with the Hadramout Tribal Alliance, a a local tribal coalition supported by Saudi Arabia.
Saudi Arabia and UAE back these political rival groups based in Yemen which sit on crossroads of shipping lanes on the edge of the predominant energy-exporting region in the Middle East, Hindustan Times reported earlier.
While Abu Dhabi and Riyadh are the are rival powerbrokers in Yemen’s government-run areas, the Gulf powers form the backbone of the coalition aimed at dislodging the Houthi rebels who in 2014 forced the government from the capital Sanaa and seized Yemen’s most populated areas.
After almost a decade-long civil war, the Houthis continue to remain in place while the Saudis and Emiratis back different factions in the government-held territories.
