Yemen's govt and separatists agree to ceasefire, to start peace talks

The Saudi-led coalition embroiled in a years-long conflict in Yemen has announced that Emirati-backed southern separatists and the country’s internationally recognised government have agreed to a ceasefire after months of infighting.

Coalition spokesman Col Turki al Maliki said on Monday delegates from the separatists’ Southern Transitional Council and the Yemeni government are meeting in the Saudi capital of Riyadh to push the implementation of a November 2019 deal that ended earlier fighting.

Violence has flared between the separatist group and government forces since the Southern Transitional Council declared self-rule over the key port city Aden and other southern provinces in April. 

The renewed clashes reopened a new front inside the larger civil war, which has killed over 112,000 people and ignited what the United Nations has labeled the world’s worst humanitarian crisis.

READ MORE: Why are Saudi and the UAE competing in southern Yemen?

Peace process

The intensifying split in the south has also hobbled authorities’ response to the coronavirus pandemic and complicated attempts to jump-start a wider peace process.

Maliki denounced recent clashes in the remote island of Socotra in the Gulf of Aden, a UNESCO World Heritage site, as well as the southern province of Abyan.

The STC appointed a new Socotra governor on Monday after the separatists effectively seized control of the area amid fighting that threatened to cause irreparable harm to the island's rare plant and animal species. 

The Yemeni government rejected the secessionists' advances as a “coup” and on Monday called for the release of local journalist Abdullah Badhan, who was arrested in a sweep of civilians who opposed the Emirati presence on the archipelago, according to the Information Ministry.

The coalition urged all parties to “stop the bloodshed by adhering to the Riyadh agreement," which stipulated the handover of heavy weapons, the withdrawal of rival forces and the formation of a new government. 

Maliki said the coalition would deploy forces to monitor a ceasefire in the flashpoint Abyan governorate, which lies between government and separatist forces.

Nizar Haitham, a spokesman for the STC, welcomed the coalition’s calls for a ceasefire and de-escalation across Yemen’s southern governorates. In a statement, he emphasised the urgent need to implement the Riyadh deal and thanked Saudi Arabia for its diplomatic role.

Three officials in the council’s leadership said that while the separatists stood by their declaration of self-rule, they were open to Saudi-led negotiations. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorised to brief the media.

The UAE’s Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, Anwar Gargash, tweeted his appreciation for Saudi Arabia’s “relentless efforts to achieve stability in Yemen.”

Yemen’s descent into turmoil started in 2014 when the Shia Houthi rebels overran the capital, Sanaa, and much of the country’s north, driving the government of President Abd Rabbu Mansour Hadi into exile.

READ MORE: UAE-backed separatists: Two-state solution for Yemen should not be feared

Hadi's rule

A US-backed, Saudi-led coalition intervened the following year to try and restore Hadi's rule. The costly war has settled into a stalemate, compelling major regional players to seek a way out. This spring, Saudi Arabia declared a unilateral ceasefire, which quickly collapsed.

Last summer, the UAE withdrew its forces and said it was ending its role in the conflict. But experts say it continues to wield influence through its proxies to ensure control of key areas on Yemen’s 2,000 km of coastline. 

The country lies on a strategic waterway leading to the Persian Gulf, through which much of the world’s oil flows.

The secessionist council, which is an umbrella group of heavily armed and well-financed militias propped up by the UAE since 2015, hopes to restore an independent southern Yemen, which existed from 1967 until unification in 1990.