THE US/YEMEN: Washington moved fast to undo the damage to relations with Yemen, its new friend in the Gulf, by releasing an arms shipment en route to Aden. Michael Jansen explains why
THEThe unlikely alliance between Yemen and the US was forged in October 2000 after al-Qaeda mounted an attack in Aden harbour on the USS Cole, which killed 17 sailors. The US responded by offering to train Yemen's over-stretched and inefficient security forces, headed by the president's son, Mr Ahmad Saleh.
Co-operation was stepped up after the September 2001 attacks on New York and Washington. Since then Yemen has played an active role in the anti-terror campaign by rounding up or killing local members of al-Qaeda, the movement which carried out the strikes in the US. Several hundred Yemeni and non-Yemeni suspects have been rounded up, processed and jailed, released or deported. At present there are around 150 militants in detention. Last month Yemen arrested an al-Qaeda suspect, Mr Abel Rahim al-Nashiri, and turned him over to the US.
Yemen has a key role to play. During the US-sponsored war against Soviet forces in Afghanistan, many Yemenis joined the "mujahedeen," the holy warriors seeking to liberate that country from Russian occupation. Among them was Osama bin Laden, who is Saudi of Yemeni origin and founded al-Qaeda. When veterans of that conflict, "Yemeni-Afghans", returned home some took part in constant but low-level tribal warfare against the government in Sanaa. Tribesmen in the oil-rich Marib province near the capital kidnapped foreigners for ransom and attacked officials. Shabwa province became a haven for al-Qaeda militants fleeing the US military campaign in Afghanistan. One Yemeni, Mr Khaled Almidhar, was recruited by al-Qaeda and took part in the operation in the US. In spite of the upgrading of Yemen's security, large areas of the country remain outside government control. In September, al-Qaeda operatives used a remote controlled boat to blow a hole in the side of a French tanker off the Yemeni shore.
The US Central Intelligence Agency retaliated by deploying a Predator unmanned drone to fire a missile at a vehicle carrying six militants, including an al-Qaeda leader said to be responsible for the Cole operation, Mr Ali Qaed Senyan al-Harithi. When the US admitted it carried out the "hit" and said it had the approval of the government, angry tribesmen killed a government official and set off bombs in the capital.
These tit-for-tat attacks have made the US-Yemeni alliance highly unpopular in tribal areas and amongst the alienated urban poor. A US war against Iraq could compel the President, Mr Ali Abdullah Saleh, who adopts a pan-Arab line, to distance his country from Washington.
Mr Saleh supported Iraq's tentative reconciliation with Kuwait during the March Arab summit and the leaders' declaration that an attack on Iraq would be viewed as an attack on all Arabs.