UAE to pull troops out of Yemen after Saudi-led airstrike

FAWAZ SALMAN / REUTERS

Billboards show images of Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, president of the United Arab Emirates, and Aidarous al-Zubaidi, the head of the UAE-backed separatist Southern Transitional Council, in Aden, Yemen, today.

AL MUKALLA, Yemen >> The United Arab Emirates said today that it was pulling its remaining troops out of Yemen, hours after a Saudi-led airstrike targeted a UAE shipment, an episode that has laid bare the deepening rift between two Persian Gulf powerhouses.

The escalation pits two key U.S. allies against each other. Amid the crisis, Secretary of State Marco Rubio spoke with the Saudi foreign minister, Prince Faisal bin Farhan, about “ongoing tensions in Yemen,” a State Department spokesperson said.

Early today, the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen launched an airstrike on what it said was an arms shipment bound for a group of Yemeni separatists who are backed by the UAE.

The Saudi-led coalition has supported Yemen’s internationally recognized government since the country splintered into various factions after the outbreak of civil war in 2014.

Brig. Gen. Turki al-Malki, a Saudi military official and coalition spokesperson, said the arms were intended for the Southern Transitional Council, or STC, a UAE-backed group that has swept through southern Yemen in recent weeks seizing territory.

The UAE Foreign Ministry denied that the shipment included any weapons, saying it contained vehicles intended for UAE forces in Yemen only, not for any Yemeni party.

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Hours later, the UAE Defense Ministry announced it was voluntarily withdrawing its remaining forces from Yemen, following calls from the Yemeni government for it to do so.

Saudi Arabia and the UAE once led a military coalition to try to defeat the Houthis, a rebel militia that seized control of the Yemeni capital Sanaa in 2014 with Iranian support, igniting the civil war.

Yet there have been several significant drawdowns of UAE forces, and the UAE’s statement today said its presence in Yemen was “limited to specialized teams as part of counterterrorism efforts.” It was unclear how many soldiers the UAE had in Yemen, or what impact their departure would have there.

The strike early this morning was on the southern port of Al Mukalla and was prompted by the arrival of two ships from the UAE without permits, according to al-Malki. He said in a statement that crew members had begun unloading a “large quantity” of weapons and armored vehicles.

“Given the danger and escalation posed by these weapons, which threaten security and stability, the coalition air forces conducted a limited military operation this morning targeting the equipment,” al-Malki said. He did not say whether there had been any casualties.

The airstrike was the first time Saudi forces had been known to have directly fired on assets that they said were linked to the STC, though an official from the group accused the Saudis of targeting its affiliates with strikes Friday. Saudi Arabia did not acknowledge any strikes at that time.

Over the weekend, Saudi Arabia issued an ultimatum demanding that the separatists withdraw from territory they have seized in the provinces of Hadramaut and al-Mahra.

The strikes marked a notable increase in tensions between Gulf powers that had been allied, analysts said.

“After years of indirect competition through local proxies, the dispute now appears to be moving toward a more direct confrontation,” said Farea al-Muslimi, a Yemeni research fellow at Chatham House, a think tank in London. The situation, he said, was “entering a particularly volatile and dangerous phase.”

Saudi Arabia and the UAE have diverged in their foreign policies in recent years, backing rival powers in Yemen and, farther afield, in Sudan.

The civil war in Yemen has settled into stalemate, with the Houthis in control of the north, while the south is under the administration of the internationally recognized government, which is backed by the Saudis.

The STC is ostensibly part of the internationally recognized government, but it has long agitated for an independent state in southern Yemen. The group was founded in 2017 with financial and military support from the United Arab Emirates.

The UAE government’s priorities in Yemen are opaque. UAE officials typically say they support the Yemeni people’s aspirations, whether that means one or two states. But some analysts say they believe UAE leaders are trying to build a crescent of influence along Yemen’s southern coast. That would allow them to control maritime trade routes by securing strategic ports and islands.

After today’s airstrike, the head of Yemen’s government, Rashad al-Alimi, said in a televised address that the separatists’ recent moves were pushing the country toward “chaos and division” and accused the UAE of fueling the war. He had sent an official request Friday to the Saudi-led coalition, asking it to intervene.

Residents of Al Mukalla, the capital of the Hadramaut province, reported hearing a loud explosion at about 4:20 a.m.

Images from international news agencies showed a large industrial port crowded with dozens of military vehicles and pickup trucks, many of which were badly burned or destroyed.

Ahmed Saleh, a local journalist affiliated with the STC, said by telephone that he saw vehicles damaged after the strike and flames billowing from inside the port facility, with military vehicles encircling the area. “The explosions shattered and damaged the windows of the building near the port,” he added.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

© 2025 The New York Times Company

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