UAE signs $1.3B in arms deals; U.S. raises smuggling to Yemen

ABU DHABI, United Arab Emirates — The United Arab Emirates’ yearslong war in Yemen alongside Saudi Arabia bled into the start of a biennial Abu Dhabi arms fair Sunday, which saw the Emirates sign $1.3 billion in deals.

One manufacturer displayed a model of a machine gun on sale that’s now in the hands of Emiratibacked militiamen in Yemen, while the armored personnel carriers and tanks used in the war in the Arab world’s poorest country also could be seen at the show. Even the military show that began the fair included troops raiding a militant hideout equipped with both mobile and landbased ballistic missiles, just like those in the possession of Yemen’s Houthi rebels.

While Emirati officials avoided discussing Yemen, allied American officials linked arms smuggling there to what they described as the wider malign activities of Iran across the greater Middle East.

“My assumption is there are still things going into Yemen that I need to stop . ... There is nothing good happening by arms being illegally shipped into Yemen,” said Vice Adm. James Malloy, the head of the U.S. Navy’s 5th Fleet command that oversees the region.

The UAE entered Yemen’s war in March 2015 alongside Saudi Arabia to back Yemen’s internationally recognized government, which the Houthis had pushed out of the capital, Sanaa.

The war has pushed Yemen to the brink of famine and killed more than 60,000 people since 2016, according to the U.S.based Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project, or ACLED, which tracks the conflict.