Saudi Arabia conducted airstrikes early on Tuesday against Yemeni separatist forces backed by the UAE, adding to the complexity of the protracted conflict.
The UAE was until not very long ago a part of the Saudi-led coalition fighting the Houthis, who are aligned with their regional rival Iran and govern most of Yemen.
The renewed fighting centres on the Southern Transitional Council, a separatist group backed by the UAE that controls parts of southern Yemen.
The STC has in recent days pushed into new areas, including the port city of Mukalla in Hadramout which had been held by Saudi-aligned forces.
Riyadh said these advances crossed a red line.
On Tuesday, Saudi warplanes struck targets in Mukalla, claiming they were aimed at UAE weapons shipments for the STC.
Riyadh said in a statement that the ships had switched off their tracking systems and unloaded arms and armoured vehicles that posed an immediate threat.
“The crews had the disabled tracking devices aboard the vessels and unloaded a large amount of weapons and combat vehicles in support of Southern Transitional Council’s forces,” it said. “Considering that the aforementioned weapons constitute an imminent threat, and an escalation that threatens peace and stability, the Coalition Air Force has conducted this morning a limited airstrike that targeted weapons and military vehicles offloaded from the two vessels in Mukalla.”
The STC voiced “serious concern” about the strikes, claiming they specifically targeted its elite units in Hadhramaut, a strategic province bordering Saudi Arabia.
Saudi officials stressed the strikes were carried out overnight to ensure “no collateral damage occurred”.
The airstrikes mark a sharp escalation between Saudi Arabia and the STC and publicly expose growing friction between Riyadh and Abu Dhabi. The neighbours have backed different groups inside Yemen despite being partners for much of the war against the Houthis.
The Saudi foreign ministry directly warned the UAE over its role. Abu Dhabi’s backing of the STC was “extremely dangerous”, it said, urging the neighbouring country to take measures to preserve bilateral relations.
Riyadh called the UAE’s support for STC a “threat to the kingdom’s national security as well as to security and stability in the Republic of Yemen and the region”.
In a separate statement, Riyadh said its “national security was a red line”.
It also said the UAE should heed a call by the chief of Yemen’s presidential council for Emirati forces to leave the country.
Rashad al-Alimi, head of the Presidential Leadership Council – the executive body of Yemen’s internationally recognised government opposed to the Houthis – cancelled a joint defence agreement with the UAE, ordering all UAE forces to leave Yemen within 24 hours, Al Jazeera reported on Tuesday.
He also declared a 72-hour air and naval blockade on all seaports and border crossings.
This escalation in tensions indicates that Yemen’s conflict is only deepening. In the south the STC is expanding control in Hadramout and Al-Mahra, areas which were largely spared from direct fighting for more than a decade.
These regions are strategically important, holding the bulk of Yemen’s oil reserves and key ports.
In the north, Houthi forces remain entrenched, including in the capital Sanaa.
The Saudi Foreign Ministry has released a statement expressing disappointment in actions taken by the United Arab Emirates in pressuring the Southern Transitional Council (STC) in Yemen to conduct military operations in the Hadramout and Al-Mahara Governorates of Eastern Yemen,… pic.twitter.com/fTf419zuOM
— OSINTdefender (@sentdefender) December 30, 2025
Yemen’s civil war escalated in 2014 when the Houthi seized Sanaa, demanding a new government and lower fuel prices.
They later seized the presidential palace, forcing president Abd Rabbu Mansour Hadi to resign and flee first to Aden and then into exile in Saudi Arabia.
In March 2015, Saudi Arabia cobbled together a coalition of Gulf states, including the UAE, to launch airstrikes and economic sanctions against the Houthis in an attempt to restore Hadi’s rule.
The coalition also imposed a naval blockade to prevent Iranian arms from reaching the Houthis.
BIG: Saudi airstrikes hit Yemen’s Mukalla Port, targeting ships from the UAE carrying armored vehicles and weapons for UAE-backed Southern Transitional Council (STC) separatists.
— Clash Report (@clashreport) December 30, 2025
Tensions between Saudi-backed and UAE-backed forces have escalated sharply after pro-UAE forces… pic.twitter.com/ExPP78VVTz
In the years since, Saudi Arabia and the UAE have carried out thousands of airstrikes against the Houthis, while the UAE has also backed separatist forces in the south like the STC, complicating the conflict.
The intervention of the Gulf states turned Yemen into a regional proxy battlefield along the Sunni-Shia divide, intensifying the humanitarian crisis, according to the Council on Foreign Relations.
Analysts warn the STC’s rapid unilateral expansion risks provoking rival groups, deepening instability, and pushing the country towards a de facto partition.
Speaking to Yemeni diplomats on 23 December, Mr Al-Alimi argued that the STC’s actions threatened internal stability and undermined the security of neighbouring states, according to the state news agency SABA.
He emphasised that “under no circumstances can partnership in governance turn into rebellion against the state or an attempt to impose reality by force”.
He also warned the STC’s actions could complicate regional security and international efforts to safeguard maritime routes, energy supplies, and commercial shipping in the Arabian Sea, Red Sea, and Gulf of Aden.
Saudi Arabia echoed these concerns. On 25 December, the kingdom emphasised that recent STC military movements were an “unjustified escalation” and harmed Yemenis and the coalition’s broader objectives.
The STC, for its part, seeks to restore South Yemen as an independent state, reviving borders that existed before the country unified in 1990. Its supporters have recently flown the flag of South Yemen and held demonstrations calling for secession.
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