Secretary General urges restraint in war torn Yemen

United Nations

Sphinx News: Ahmed Ali

As Yemen continues to undergo the brutal effects of a long-lasting war, the UN warns that the latest STC (Yemen’s Southern Transitional Council) developments divert a path to peace.

Originally emanating as a local conflict of attrition where Houthi forces competed with the Yemeni government for political rule, the Yemeni war would rapidly deteriorate into an arena for regional proxy struggle.

Intervening in 2015, a Saudi-led coalition sought to respond to rapid Houthi expansion along the Gulf of Aden, where restoring power back into the hands of Abdrabbuh Mansour Hadi and the internationally recognized Yemeni government became paramount. Whilst subverting the expansion of the Houthis and reclaiming the largest Yemeni port of Aden, the Houthis maintained control over the state’s capital, Sanaa. As conflict embroiled but remained largely stagnant, 2022 saw a UN-brokered ceasefire between Yemen’s warring parties, eventually paving the way for a proposed political solution. Supported and sponsored by both Saudi Arabia and the UAE, Hadi’s political government was dissolved, paving the way for a separate Leadership Council under the authority of Yemeni political leader Rashad al-Alimi. Along with Al-Alimi’s primary rule, the new PLC (Presidential Leadership Council) incorporated the Southern Transitional Council (SLC) into its new government.

Formally established in 2017, the SLC was a separatist political entity formed as a faction of the Hadi governmental force. The SLC advocated for the secession of South Yemen from the Yemeni state, calling for an ultimate return to the previous countries of North and South Yemen, before their eventual unification in 1990. With the conflict having remote political optimism for the first time since it had begun, Houthi bombardments of Red Sea shipments saw yet another grave escalation. The Houthi bombing of Red Sea shipments primarily targeted cargo being sent to the Israeli state during its campaign in the Gaza enclave. This eventually attracted global condemnation and military pushback from key regional powers such as the United States, the United Kingdom, and France.

As the entirety of Yemen suffers gravely from a decade of large-scale conflict which has rendered 80 percent of its population in abject poverty and left over 20 million in urgent need of humanitarian assistance, the latest developments embolden what the Secretary-General described today as “wider escalation and further fragmentation.” Despite the 2022 political settlement intended to unite the SLC with the wider PLC, the former’s expansionist efforts have been condemned as eroding such possibility.

On December 8, reports suggest the STC shifted the fragile power balance away from Al-Alimi through expansionist efforts within the southern provinces. This consolidation of territory by the SLC is reported to be control of governorates within the south and east, including most of the governorates of Hadramout, Al-Mahrah, local oil facilities, and the city of Aden—home to the internationally recognized PLC and de facto capital of the Yemeni state.

Leader of the STC, Aidarous al-Zubaidi, has already announced that the “next goal must be Sanaa, peacefully or through war, until justice returns to its people and aggression is defeated.” Just this Monday, following their recent takeover of Hadramout and Al-Mahrah, the STC announced the launch of a military operation in the southern province of Abyan. The group has contended that such operations seek to recreate the political unification of the pre-existing South Yemen state. The STC’s military spokesman, Mohamed al-Naqeeb, added that such control will also serve as a deterrence to Al-Qaeda militants in the region, “aimed at preventing their infiltration.”

With military control of now eight southern provinces, including the massively important port of Aden, the branch of the internationally recognized PLC seeks to “expand cooperation with Washington, militarily, diplomatically and economically,” said Ahmed Atef, the STC’s representative to the United States and United Nations.

The expansion by the SLC has not only been unequivocally condemned by the PLC and its acting leader Al-Alimi, but it has also been viewed by the United Nations Secretary-General as a situation with major domestic and regional repercussions. Speaking to reporters today after his briefing to the Security Council, the Secretary-General said these “unilateral actions will not clear a path to peace.” Instead, he added that these latest developments only “deepen divisions” and “could have serious ramifications on regional peace and security — including on the Red Sea, in the Gulf of Aden, and in the Horn of Africa.”

The SG urged all parties to “exercise maximum restraint, de-escalate tensions, and resolve differences through dialogue,” calling on “regional stakeholders” to help preserve “Yemen’s territorial integrity and sovereignty.” With “nearly 4.8 million having fled their homes and 19.5 million in need of humanitarian assistance,” the SG yearns for a “sustainable, negotiated political settlement.”