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Warring factions in Yemen challenge fledgling government
By Catholic Online (NEWS CONSORTIUM)
June 7th, 2012
Catholic Online (www.catholic.org)
June 7th, 2012
Catholic Online (www.catholic.org)
Overseeing a transition to democracy in Yemen following a revolution
that erupted in January of last year, freshly sworn-in Yemeni President
Abd Rabbu Mansour Hadi faces challenges to his new government's
authority. A violent power struggle between loyalists of the old regime
of former dictator Ali Abdullah Saleh in addition to the defected
factions of the military and tribes opposed to him.
The Houthis, for example, are a Zaydi Shia ethnic group to the country's north, based in a mountainous region bordering Saudi Arabia. Houthis fighters have been in active engagement with the Yemeni army since 2004, and have since pushed further south towards the Yemeni capital of Sanaa.
The Houthis say they want more autonomy in addition to redress for previous neglect and discrimination.
The Houthis have also accused Saudi jets of entering Yemeni airspace, something the Saudis hotly deny, instead saying that the Houthis have killed their soldiers along the border.
Yemeni President Hadi has previously accused the Iranians of funding the Houthis. "They are helping them," he said on a visit to a refugee camp in the North in December 2009, "by money." International scholars say that the Houthis are engaging in a small, hidden conflict as a proxy war between Saudi Arabia and Iran.
The Yemeni army's fight has sought to contain the Houthis, but is currently unable to end the conflict outright.
And then there is the international terrorist organization al-Qaeda. Since 2008, al-Qaeda's Yemeni franchise, al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) has been growing in numbers and activity levels.
Drone strikes and offensives against al-Qaeda in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iraq, have caused many to flee to the relative safety of Yemen's more lawless rural areas in the south and southeast. Adding to the connection is the fact that Yemen is also the ancestral home of Osama bin Laden.
Bombings in the capital by the group have increased in recent years. An attack on the U.S. embassy in 2008, in addition to suicide bomber who killed more than 120 people last month all lustrates al-Qaeda's ongoing presence in the area. Over the past year and a half of political fighting, Ansar al-Sharia, a local al-Qaeda-affiliated group has seized areas of the south, including Abyan province and various towns including its capital, Zinjibar.
Jamal Benomar, the U.N. envoy to Yemen, in April said the situation remains highly volatile.
"The situation can get also out of control," Benomar said. "I said repeatedly in my briefings with the Security Council that although we can say that there is progress, when it comes to the implementation of the [power transfer] agreement generally, this country is facing major challenges and the situation is very fragile - we should never forget this."
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