Yemen

Government and Politics
In the 1960's, intervention by Saudi Arabia and Egypt on opposing sides of a civil war in North Yemen led to a long and damaging military stalemate.

Just four years after the 1990 unification of North and South Yemen, civil war erupted when southerners attempted to break away, but were defeated by Ali Abdullah Saleh's northern forces.

Houthi Takeover
Yemen, which was swept by mass Arab Spring-inspired protests in 2011, was plunged into war in March 2015 after Iranian-backed Shia Houthi rebels seized the city of Sanaa in September 2014 over a constitutional dispute. They claimed the advance was intended to save Yemen from corruption and from being divided by the draft constitution that called for devolving power to local authorities. They effectively removed President Abu-Rabbu Mansour Hadi in January 2015 after fighters seized the presidential palace and held him under house arrest. In mid-March 2015, the Houthis expanded into mostly Sunni areas in the center and west, leading to months of clashes with local tribes and al-Qaeda, raising fears of civil war. The advance of the Iranian-backed group angered Sunni Gulf Arab states, led by Saudi Arabia.

The Houthis were allied with the former President Ali Abdullah Saleh, who was still influential in the military despite having given up power in 2011 after mass protests against his rule. With Saleh's help, the Houthis controlled most of the Yemeni military, including its air force, giving them a decisive advantage. As the Houthis advanced to the new southern base of the U.S.-supported President Hadi, Saudi Arabia joined the conflict in a coalition of ten nations on March 25, 2015, launched an air campaign to support Hadi in the fight against the Houthis. Against the backdrop of the escalating conflict, Sunni Muslim extremists pledging allegiance to both al-Qaeda and the Islamic State escalated their attacks, including sectarian assaults on the Houthis. The Saudi coalition pushed back Houthi forces, who had taken control of most of the country, with fighting into the fall of 2015 focusing on the cultural city of Taiz after the southern port city of Aden was retaken by Hadi forces in July.

Throughout the fall of 2015, planes and gunboats from the Saudi-led coalition bombarded targets in northern Yemen, allowing troops loyal to Hadi to seize areas of the north in mid-December. A rare one-week truce meant to facilitate peace negotiations was compromised when fresh fighting disrupted the talks. In response, Yemeni negotiators at U.N.-sponsored peace talks agreed on December 19 to form a committee to oversee the fragile ceasefire. When negotiations broke down without a ceasefire, talks resumed on January 14, 2016.

Saudi Arabia
The Houthis, allied with the former President Ali Abdullah Saleh, who was still influential in the military despite having given up power in 2011 after mass protests against his rule, controlled most of the Yemeni military, including its air force, giving them a decisive advantage over presidential forces. As the Houthis advanced to the new southern base of the U.S.-supported President Hadi, Saudi Arabia joined the conflict in a coalition of ten nations on March 25, 2015, launched an air campaign to support Hadi in the fight against the Houthis. Against the backdrop of the escalating conflict, Sunni Muslim extremists pledging allegiance to both al-Qaeda and the Islamic State escalated their attacks, including sectarian assaults on the Houthis. The Saudi coalition pushed back Houthi forces, who had taken control of most of the country, with fighting into the fall of 2015 focusing on the cultural city of Taiz after the southern port city of Aden was retaken by Hadi forces in July.

Throughout the fall of 2015, planes and gunboats from the Saudi-led coalition bombarded targets in northern Yemen, allowing troops loyal to Hadi to seize areas of the north in mid-December. The U.N. noted that the campaign in Yemen was responsible for a disproportionate amount of attacks on civilian areas. A rare one-week truce meant to facilitate peace negotiations was compromised when fresh fighting disrupted the talks. In response, Yemeni negotiators at U.N.-sponsored peace talks agreed on December 19 to form a committee to oversee the fragile ceasefire.

Economy
Yemen remained the Arabian Peninsula's most impoverished nation, especially after the conflict killed nearly 6,000 people and plunged the population into a humanitarian crisis.