Yemen: UAE transports 100 militants to Socotra

A general view of the sand dunes and the beach in front of them in the area of Hoq is seen on March 12, 2011 in Socotra Island, Yemen [Marco Di Lauro/Getty Images]

The United Arab Emirates (UAE) yesterday transferred 100 militants belonging to the Southern Transitional Council (STC) from Yemen’s interim capital city of Aden to Socotra.

Yemeni media quoted local sources as saying that the militants were transferred “onboard an Emirati ship”, Abu Dhabi recently launched construction works of a military base in the west of Socotra, “with Saudi approval”, according to the sources.

Al Jazeera recently reported that a private Emirati plane had operated four flights in Socotra, transporting a number of European experts and UAE officers.

Early September, two Yemeni lawmakers called on the caretaker government “to explain the UAE’s commencement of building two military camps in the two eastern and western edges of Socotra island, as well as a military base without informing the official authorities.” They described the move as an “infringement against the war-torn country’s sovereignty.”

Yemen army: Houthis kill 62 civilians in Al-Hudaydah

Unless otherwise stated in the article above, this work by Middle East Monitor is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. If the image(s) bear our credit, this license also applies to them. What does that mean? For other permissions, please contact us.