Southern Yemeni leader Aidarous al-Zubaidi fled Yemen with the help of the United Arab Emirates on Tuesday night and did not arrive in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, on Wednesday for planned peace talks. File Photo by Stringer/EPA
Jan. 8 (UPI) — Separatist leader Aidarous al-Zubaidi exited Yemen with the help of the United Arab Emirates after he was charged with treason and expelled from Yemen’s Presidential Leadership Council.
Al-Zubaidi led the Southern Transitional Council in Yemen, which is supported by the UAE, and a Saudi-led coalition said he left the port city of Aden while aboard a boat on Tuesday night, the BBC reported.
The vessel carried him to the UAE-owned port of Berbera in Somaliland, where he boarded a cargo aircraft that flew him to Mogadishu, Somalia, and then a military airport in Abu Dhabi, according to The Guardian.
Neither the UAE nor the STC commented on the matter, which has raised tensions between officials in Saudi Arabia and the UAE.
The PLC expelled al-Zubaidi on Wednesday and accused him of treason when he did not arrive in the Saudi capital of Riyadh for peace talks.
The STC had sought to have southern Yemen declared an independent state and re-establish a north-south divide within Yemen that existed before the nation was unified in 1990.
The STC has controlled Aden for many years, and its leaders recently vowed to wage a guerrilla campaign while al-Zubaidi and many of his supporters remain safely in the UAE.
The STC, though, is undergoing an internal divide that has weakened it and prompted al-Zubaidi and others to leave Yemen.
Saudi-backed forces have regained territory previously held by the STC.
Tensions between Saudi Arabia and the UAE grew after separatists supported by the UAE captured territory in Yemen that reached the border with Saudi Arabia.
Saudi officials called the action a threat to their national security after earlier opposing Houthi forces in Yemen that are supported by Iran.
The UAE and Saudi Arabia had jointly opposed the Houthis, which gained control of northwestern Yemen in a 2022 cease-fire agreement.
Since then, the Saudis have backed Yemen’s PLC, which is in charge of the internationally recognized government of Yemen, while the UAE supports the separatist STC.