The Aden Al-Mustaqila TV channel, which speaks for the UAE-backed Southern Transitional Council (STC), has on Saturday called for preventing the opening of a branch of Tariq Afash’s office in the port city of Aden, southern Yemen.
The channel in a report said that it had monitored the movements of parties it described as the “northern forces” seeking to expand their movements in the city of Aden.
The channel stressed that “the STC leadership will not allow any new activity in the city,” in an explicit threat to prevent Tariq Saleh’s arrangements to open a branch of his political office in the center of Aden, the most prominent stronghold of the STC.
These threats coincide with UAE arrangements to open an office for the Tariq Saleh mercenary militia in Aden during the coming days, in light of efforts to end the STC’s influence in all southern provinces.
Last Thursday, Tariq Saleh’s forces opened an office in the city of Taiz, which is one of the strongholds of the Islah Party.
Tariq Saleh is the nephew of former Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh, who ruled North Yemen from 1978 and the united Republic of Yemen fron 1990 until his resignation in 2012. Ali Saleh, who had been a bitter enemy of the revolutionary movement led by Ansarullah during his presidency, officially tried to cooperate with it following the September 21 Revolution of 2014, but later betrayed the Revolution was was killed in a firefight in 2017.
Tariq Saleh, who had been instrumental in supporting his uncle’s betrayal and collaboration with the Saudi-led invaders, managed to flee Sana’a and established himself as one of the foremost mercenary leaders in service of the Saudi and UAE occupation forces.
As the old alliance between Saudi Arabia and the Islah Party (Muslim Brotherhood) on one side, and between the UAE and the south Yemeni separatists in the Southern Transitional Council on the other side seems to be failing, Tariq Saleh and his “nationalist” forces have recently increased in importance in the eyes of the invading coalition.
