Why the US Should Recognize South Yemen

Excerpt

On Tuesday, Saudi Arabia announced that its fighter jets bombed arms shipments unloaded by two United Arab Emirates (UAE) vessels in Yemen. The shipments had been destined for the South Transitional Council (STC) forces. The strike marked a major shift in Saudi policy and aimed at preventing the STC from reviving South Yemen, a formerly independent nation that merged into greater Yemen in 1990. An independent South Yemen is the country’s best bet to weaken the Houthi insurgency in the northwestern part of the country that has disrupted global shipping and raised inflation since 2023. 

The STC’s drive toward independence also suppresses the Islah Party, a branch of the global Muslim Brotherhood that the US Congress is currently considering whether to declare a Foreign Terrorist Organization. 

Earlier in December, the STC, led by one of the Presidential Leadership Council’s (PLC) seven vice presidents, Aidarus al-Zubaidi, launched a campaign through which it seized control of most of the province of Hadramout—Yemen’s main oil reservoir—until then under the control of the militia of PLC president Rashad al-Ulaimi and his Islamist Islah allies. Globally recognized as Yemen’s government, the PLC was formed in 2022 and entrusted with managing a transitional period.

Ulaimi is allied with Saudi Arabia, and so are three of his vice presidents, two of whom are Islah members. Zubaidi and three other vice presidents are aligned with the UAE. The PLC is therefore locked in a stalemate.

Hussain Abdul-Hussain is a research fellow at The Foundation for the Defense of Democracies (FDD). He focuses on the Gulf region and Yemen.