IRIA News

Saudi Arabia has decided to establish a military base near the Yemeni border due to recent development in Yemen.

Saudi Arabia is deploying a significant task force to the border with neighboring Yemen, where Houthi Shiite rebels allegedly forced the president to leave the country. President Hadi has been asking the UN to approve the use of foreign forces in Yemen.

The situation in Yemen remains murky, with Houthi militants claiming capture of the southern seaport of Aden, President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi’s stronghold. The fighters say the city of Aden is now under their control and they’re arresting the president’s supporters there.

#Saudi army is amassing on #Yemen border for a possible invasion after green light from all #Gulf states minus #Oman pic.twitter.com/1LR57vJMG8

— Ahmed Quraishi (@AQpk) March 25, 2015

Media reports said on Tuesday that the base will be constructed in the southern part of the country.

Saudi Defense Minister Prince Mohammed bin Salman Al Saud has been ordered to erect the facility immediately along with a number of training buildings nearby.

The move comes as Yemen’s  Houthi fighters have been fighting al-Qaeda and other terrorist groups in the in the crisis-hit country.

Fighters of Yemen’s Ansarullah movement took control of the southwestern city of Ta’izz, a strategic city between the capital, Sana’a, and Aden.

The Houthi fighters and their allies seized the city’s airport after defeating forces loyal to fugitive President Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi, security sources said.

Reports say Houthi fighters also captured several state facilities including a court complex in Ta’izz, which is Yemen’s third-largest city, on March 22.

On March 12, Yemen’s Houthi movement staged a military drill the city of Kitaf in the province of Sa’ada, along the border with Saudi Arabia.

According to reports, thousands of the members of the Houthi movement participated in the drill, in which artillery, rockets, and other weapons were used.

A Houthi media official said the drill was not meant to “pose a threat to anyone.”

The military drill came after as Saudi Arabia approved Hadi’s proposed plan to hold the country’s national dialogue in the Saudi capital, Riyadh, instead of the Yemeni capital, Sana’a, which is currently under the control of the Houthis.

The Houthi movement strongly condemned the Saudi measure, unequivocally refusing to participate in the talks.

In late January, Hadi, along with the cabinet of Prime Minister Khaled Bahah, stepped down over pressure from the Ansarullah revolutionaries, but the Yemeni parliament did not approve his resignation.

Hadi fled his home in the capital on February 21 after weeks under effective house arrest and went to Aden, Yemen’s second-largest city, where he officially withdrew his resignation and highlighted his intention to resume duties.

The Ansarullah fighters took control of the capital in September 2014 and are currently trying to advance toward Aden.

Some Yemeni military officers don’t like the idea of foreign intervention.

“We express our total and utter rejection of any external interference in Yemeni affairs under any pretext and in any form and from any side,” Reuters cited statement of a group of officers calling themselves Higher Committee to Preserve the Armed Forces and Security.

“All members of the armed forces and security and all the sons of the proud people of Yemen with all its components will confront with all their strength and heroism any attempt to harm the pure soil of the homeland, its independence or its sovereignty or to threaten its unity and territorial integrity,”the military group announced on a website.

In late February, Yemen’s Shiite rebel leader Abdel-Malik al-Houthi accused Saudi Arabia of attempting to divide Yemen along sectarian lines.

“Our elder sister, the Saudi kingdom, doesn’t respect the Yemenis and wants to impose here in Yemen the sequence of events and divisions that happened in Libya,” al-Houthi said, as cited by the AP

 IA/MHB/AS/RT