Hadi forces take control over traffic police camp in Socotra

SOCOTRA, Dec. 23 (YPA) – Security forces of the Saudi-backed local authority on Socotra Island took control of the traffic police camp, sources said on Sunday.

The outgoing director of the police, Colonel Ahmed Saad al-Kadumi refused to hand over the police department and the camp to lieutenant  Wasm Ali Omar, who was recently appointed.

Colonel al-Kadumi had been holed up inside the camp with UAE-backed gunmen, refusing to hand over the camp and the traffic police department.

A local source said that the security forces led by the director of security Brig. Gen. Faez al-Shathi in the “Hadi government and the Islah Party forces” took control of the camp while the forces loyal to the Emirates withdrew.

The outgoing police chief had deployed gunmen around the camp.

The Saudi-backed governor of the Socotra archipelago, Ramzi Mahrous, issued a series of decrees aimed at limiting UAE’s influence on the island as well as the dismissal of pro-UAE security and local leaders.

There is a conflict between regional and international projects of influence on the strategic Yemeni island of Socotra, which lies between the Arabian Sea and the Indian Ocean.

E.M