Yemeni official attacks the UAE and demands end to the war
The Yemeni governor of Al Mahwit, Saleh Samee, criticized the UAE role in the war against his country and demanded the Yemeni President Abdrabbuh Mansur Hadi end his alliance with Abu Dhabi.
In an interview with the Suhail TV channel in Riyadh, Samee said that President Hadi should do away with the services of a party of the Saudi-UAE alliance if they decided to continue in their violations.
He added that Hadi asked for support from Saudi Arabia, and did not ask for support from any other country, and described that party, in reference to the UAE, as being greedy and behaving stupidly.
The Governor pointed out that the time has come for the Yemeni president to clarify that there are many embarrassing aspects of the relationship with the coalition which requires dealing with.
He said that a party in the Arab alliance is paranoid, referring to the UAE, explaining that if the UAE keeps being irrational, measures will be taken.
He said that Abu Dhabi will hand over all of Yemen to Iran in the end, not just Sana’a. “Some of our allies [referring to the UAE] have entered [the war] with us under the pretext of confrontation and support for legitimacy, but the fact of their work with us is counterrevolution,” he said. “And they consider the legitimacy as the fruit of the Arab Spring and must be destroyed with an alternative legitimacy.”
“After the entry of UAE forces into liberated areas of the Huthi-backed Iranian militias, those who liberated these areas were liquidated – either killed, arrested or assassinated and some are forbidden to enter these areas.”
“The head of state is not allowed to return to the liberated areas… including the Minister of Defense, he is forbidden to enter the province of Aden and cannot attend the meetings of the Council of Ministers.”
When the anchor asked the Yemeni official about the authority that prevented the defense minister from attending the cabinet meetings, he said: “The parties that control the fate of Aden are preventing the minister from performing his duties. If we keep the battle with this spirit, Yemen will eventually be handed over to Iran, not just Sana’a.”
The Yemenis say that the UAE deliberately formed armed militias in several Yemeni provinces, such as Aden and Hadramout and Shabwa, and in Socotra.
But the Yemeni government rejects the existence of such formations of military or security, and stresses the need for subordination to the Ministries of Defense and Interior, noting that these formations do not enjoy any legitimate presence.
Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates are leading a military alliance involving local forces composed of various Yemeni factions and trying to restore the internationally recognized government to power after the ousted Houthi militia allied with Iran in 2014. International organizations accuse the alliance of committing crimes against civilians.
