U.S.intelligence penetrates into Yemen’s Hadramout amid struggle to control

On May 10, 2023 1:03 AM

SANAA, May 10 (YPA) – The U.S. military and political visits have been remarkably frequent to Hadramout province, in eastern Yemen, over the past months.

The latest developments in the American interest in Hadramout were represented by a new visit to a number of American officers headed by “Keith Newsome, Head of the Civil Affairs Team in the United States of America,” who arrived during the past hours to the city of Mukalla, the center of the province.

Political sources familiar with the matter stated that the American officers held a meeting with the coalition-backed governor of Hadramout, Mabkhout bin Madhi, and the commander of the pro-UAE “second military region”, Fayez al-Tamimi, to discuss strengthening security in the province.

The sources reported that the American officers presented Bin Madhi and Al-Tamimi with “new plans to combat terrorism,” making the fight against terrorism and smuggling a pretext for the expansion of American military activity in Hadramout and Mahra.

Local sources from Hadramout, preferred not to be identified, stated that “US intelligence has penetrated the Hadrami community, by supporting various activities targeting women and children, which reached the point where the US ambassador, Stephen Feigen, held direct meetings with civil organizations and activists from the people of Hadramout.

The visit of the American officers came in light of the military tensions in Hadramout between the UAE and Saudi factions, which necessitated the arrival of the commander of the “support and attribution” in the coalition, Sultan al-Baqami, who holds a “Saudi nationality,” last week, to Hadramout, refusing the deployment of the Emirati factions at the Al-Wadiah border crossing.

Saudi Arabia imposed the so-called Dara al-Watan forces, affiliated to it, at the al-Wadiah crossing, and the arrival of Salafist leader to these forces,” Bashir al-Mudarbi al-Subaihi, to the crossing, based on the summons of the commander of the coalition forces, Mutlaq al-Azima.

The US, British and French military movements expanded in the oil-rich eastern provinces, during the last period, away from the so-called “leadership council” and the coalition-backed government, with the implementation of the repeated visits of the US ambassador to Hadramout and Mahra, accompanied on one of his visits by the commander of the Fifth Fleet to Al-Ghaydah airport, early last March.

The seasons of the unprecedented repeated US visits to Hadramout coincided with the appearance of US soldiers, accompanied by police dogs and armored vehicles, in the streets of the city of Ghail Bawazir, northeast of Mukalla city, during October 2012, with US officials who carried out secret visits to the province, including military headquarters of the coalition.

Last February, the Saudi-run Al-Hadath TV had confirmed, quoting its sources in Washington, that “the US Department of Defense has two military bases affiliated with the CIA in the southern and eastern provinces of Yemen under the control of the coalition, including a base in Mukalla, the center of Hadramout, while it did not disclose the other base.”

Meanwhile, local news reported last February that the US forces had installed an air defense system in the coastal city of “Al-Shihr” in Hadramout.

The American forces also have taken the Al-Ghaydah Civil Airport of Mahra a joint military base with the British and Zionist forces since 2017, in addition to their presence in Aden, the Balhaf Gas facility and Al-Anad Air Base, south of Lahj province.