New report details UAE occupation’s violations on Mayon Island in Yemen
SANAA, April 28 (YPA) – The UAE occupation forces have turned the Yemeni island of “Mayon” into a military base, a corridor for the entry and exit of its mercenaries and an entry for their support in Aden and the rest of the occupied areas in southern Yemen.
According to a report published by al-Arabi al-Jadeed newspaper, the UAE has rehabilitated the Mayon military airport, which it also uses to support its agents on the west coast, as well as those in Aden.
“The UAE continues to tamper with vital and strategic areas and parts of Yemen, with a focus on scattered islands, one of the most important buried wealth in the country,” the report said.
Yemeni military and security sources spoke of the violations on the island of Mayon, in the heart of the Bab al-Mandab Strait, which links the Red Sea, the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Aden, amid Abu Dhabi’s attempt to replicate what it had done in Socotra, the newspaper said.
“The UAE has isolated the 13-square-kilometer island, with a population of about 250 people, from its Yemeni surroundings, in an attempt to cut it off and deprive any Yemeni party of control of the Bab al-Mandab Strait,” the newspaper quoted the sources as saying.
According to the sources, the UAE has imposed numerous measures to prevent access to the island, with exception of a few mercenaries whom it absolutely trusts, including a number of journalists and media professionals, while others are prevented from reaching the island.
The newspaper quoted a senior source in the local authority in Aden province, and another in the Aden Ports Corporation, confirmed that the local authorities on the island are not even able to know the conditions of the people on the island of Myon, and no Yemeni official has been able to reach or visit the island, since the UAE took control of it in October 2015.
Four of the residents of the island spoke to the newspaper, revealing the UAE occupation practices in Mayon, pointing out that the UAE forces deliberately harassed fishermen in the process of fishing, as fishing is a source of livelihood for the majority of the island’s inhabitants, in addition to entering and breaking into citizens’ homes under flimsy pretexts, and preventing the arrival of humanitarian aid and organizations to the island.
According to the residents, only The UAE’s Red Rrescent, which is humiliating citizens, working on the island, pointing out that the aim of these practices is to forcing them to leave and emigrate from the island, or to accept the temptations of sending the people of Mayon to the UAE.
They confirmed to the newspaper that the Flag of Yemen is forbidden to be raised on the island of Mayon, while the UAE flag is raised instead, and the flag of secession of the UAE-backed Southern Transitional Council.
Emirati delegations arrive on the island on an almost daily basis, noting that their movements do not stop, and Emirati officers meet with a number of their mercenaries on the island, they said.
They also revealed that there was a prison in Mayon, where dozens of detainees and abductees are believed to have been transferred from the southern provinces to the prison.
The report added that the inhabitants of the Island of Mayon suffer from the difficulty of life, and the lack of services almost completely, especially health services. Since there is no hospital on the island but a four-room health centre that, according to the islanders, is not fit, “even for pregnancy of a woman”,
As residents are forced to transport sick and pregnant women by worn-out boats to drive them to land, residents refuse to give up to UAE pressures and harassment, migrating to Aden, Taiz or outside Yemen.
The report pointed out that the island of Mayon is experiencing overlapping powers, as it belonged to the province of Aden, but because of amendments issued by the previous Yemeni governments.
The Island became administratively under the province of Taiz, while electorally under the directorate of al-Ma’ala in Aden province, and its revenues to the Institution of ports of Aden, and a conflict between the provinces of Aden and Taiz continuously over the island.