Yemen’s Aden airport shuts as Saudi-UAE rift deepens

DUBAI, Jan 1 (Reuters) – Flights at Yemen’s Aden international airport were halted on Thursday, the latest sign of a deepening crisis between Gulf powers Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, whose rivalry is reshaping war-torn Yemen.

At the airport — the main international gateway for parts of Yemen outside Houthi control — passengers crowded the terminal, waiting for updates on their flights.

Later on Thursday, Yemeni sources said flights between Aden and all destinations outside the UAE would resume, though Reuters was unable to confirm that immediately.

Air traffic was shut down due to a row over curbs on flights to the UAE, though there were contradictory accounts of exactly what had happened and who was responsible.     

Awadh al-Subaihi said he had been waiting at the airport for a flight to Cairo for medical treatment. “We are suffering, and many other patients and elderly people here are waiting in a difficult situation,” he said.

The UAE backs the separatist Southern Transitional Council (STC) that seized swathes of southern Yemen from the internationally recognised government last month. 

Saudi Arabia, which backs the government, regarded that move as a threat, triggering the biggest crisis between it and Gulf neighbour the UAE in decades. 

The UAE-backed STC controls the transport ministry in the internationally recognised coalition government, whose main leadership is supported by Saudi Arabia. 

The ministry accused Saudi Arabia in a statement of imposing an air blockade, saying Riyadh had instituted measures requiring all flights to go via Saudi Arabia for extra checks. 

It added that when it objected to this, Saudi Arabia had clarified that the restriction was only on flights between Aden and the UAE.  

DISAGREEMENT OVER WHO IS RESPONSIBLE

A Saudi source denied any involvement in restricting flights, adding that Yemen’s own internationally recognised government had imposed the requirement on flights between Aden and the UAE in order to curb escalating tensions. 

The Saudi source added that the southern-controlled ministry had then responded by ordering a full shutdown of air traffic rather than comply with the restrictions on flights to and from the UAE. 

An official source at the transport minister’s office denied this, saying the minister had not issued any decisions to close the airport.

Reuters could not immediately reach the leadership of the internationally recognised government, which has been in Saudi Arabia since the STC seized swathes of the south last month, for comment on the airport closure and flight restrictions. 

The UAE Foreign Ministry did not immediately reply to a request for comment on the airport closure.

The tussle is the latest in a deepening crisis in Yemen that has exposed a deep rift between the two Gulf oil powers.

Saudi Arabia this week accused the UAE of pressuring Yemen’s STC to push towards the kingdom’s borders and declared its national security a “red line,” prompting the UAE to say it was pulling its remaining forces out of Yemen.

That followed an airstrike by Saudi-led coalition forces on the southern Yemeni port of Mukalla that the coalition said was a dock used to provide foreign military support to the separatists.

(Reporting by Maha El Dahan, Editing by Howard Goller)