Khamenei meets Yemen rebels

TEHRAN: Iran’s supreme leader has held talks with a senior Yemeni rebel official just days after the long-running intervention against the rebels by its regional foes Saudi Arabia and the UAE suffered a major setback. Ayatollah Ali Khamenei hosted Houthi rebel spokesman Mohammed Abdul Salam at his Tehran residence late Tuesday after southern separatists backed by the United Arab Emirates seized Yemen’s second city Aden on Saturday.

The defeat for President Abedrabbo Mansour Hadi’s unionist supporters, who have been backed by Saudi Arabia, exposed the divergent ambitions of the key coalition partners and threatened to weaken their common struggle against the Houthis. Khamenei renewed his support for the rebels, who control the Yemeni capital Sanaa and much of the north, and accused Iran’s foes of a “plot” to partition the country. “I declare my support for the mujahidah (struggle) of Yemen,” he said in a statement issued after the talks.

“Saudi and UAE and their supporters have committed major crimes in Yemen. “They seek to divide Yemen. This plot should be strongly resisted and a unified, coherent Yemen with sovereign integrity should be endorsed,” the Iranian leader said in an English-language statement. South Yemen was an independent country until it merged with the north in 1990. An armed secession bid four years later ended with its occupation by northern forces, which provoked resentments that persist to this day.

Four and a half years of Saudi- and UAE-led military intervention in support of Hadi has seen the Houthi rebels pushed out of the south. But the UAE, which has led ground operations in the region, has relied heavily on southern separatists at the expense of the unionists, who dominate Hadi’s government. Khamenei called for talks to stop Yemen being divided. “Given Yemen’s religious and ethnic diversity, protecting Yemen’s integrity requires domestic dialogues,” he said.