How Saudi Arabia helped al-Qaeda in Yemen

Once driven to near irrelevance by the rise of Islamic State abroad and security crackdowns at home, al Qaeda in Yemen now openly rules a mini-state with a war chest swollen by an estimated $100 million in looted bank deposits and revenue from running the country’s third largest port.
If Islamic State’s capital is the Syrian city of Raqqa, then al Qaeda’s is Mukalla, a southeastern Yemeni port city of 500,000 people. Al Qaeda fighters there have abolished taxes for local residents, operate speedboats manned by RPG-wielding fighters who impose fees on ship traffic, and make propaganda videos in which they boast about paving local roads and stocking hospitals.
The economic empire was described by more than a dozen diplomats, Yemeni security officials, tribal leaders and residents of Mukalla. Its emergence is the most striking unintended consequence of the Saudi-led military intervention in Yemen. The campaign, backed by the United States, has helped Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) to become stronger than at any time since it first emerged almost 20 years ago....
“I prefer that al Qaeda stay here, not for Al Mukalla to be liberated,” said one 47-year-old resident. “The situation is stable, more than any ‘free’ part of Yemen. The alternative to al Qaeda is much worse.”
A senior Yemeni government official said the war against the Houthis “provided a suitable environment for the … expansion of al Qaeda.” The withdrawal of government army units from their bases in the south, allowed al Qaeda to acquire “very large quantities of sophisticated and advanced weapons, including shoulder-fired missiles and armed vehicles.”
As well, the coalition’s preoccupation with fighting the Houthis “made it easier for al Qaeda elements to expand in more than one area,” he said. “And this is why al Qaeda has today become stronger and more dangerous and we are working with the coalition now to go after elements of the group … and will continue until they are destroyed.”

al-Qaeda winning hearts and minds

Half of Yemen’s 24.4 million people don’t have access to clean water — the most basic of human needs. This stark statistic is in clearest evidence in the country’s Hadramaut region, where oil flows freely but water taps run dry and tribal councils are powerless to improve people’s lives. But there’s a group working to change that. A group that, last week — much to the delight of its parched residents — unveiled a freshly dug well in the country’s arid southern territory. The group’s name? Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula.
AQAP is one of the U.S.-designated terror organization’s most powerful divisions and since the beginning of 2016, the group has quietly seized vast swaths of Yemen, undercutting its rival, the Islamic State group, which has been the main focus of the West’s counterterrorism strategy for the last year. ISIS may have dominated international media coverage, but in Yemen, AQAP has overshadowed its younger sibling with its grassroots approach, providing essential public services to gain the trust of the local population. The group has also been willing to share power with local governing institutions before it establishes its own so-called caliphate.

a weird reverse migration

Known as the “gateway to grief,” the strait’s treacherous waters have swallowed more than 3,700 African migrants since 2006. Across the 28-kilometer strait lies Yemen, a country ravaged by bitter conflict. But to these job seekers—overwhelmingly Ethiopian, with a few Somalis, Sudanese and Eritreans—the conflict is no deterrent. If anything, it has become an important selling point for those arranging passage.
“Saudi Arabia is their destination. Many are returning to jobs they had there before,” says Ali Abdallah Al-Jefri, who directs the International Organization for Migration’s (IOM) Migrants Response Center here. Human smugglers tell the migrants that because of the raging violence in Yemen, “now is a good time to try to go back to Saudi Arabia,” Mr. Al-Jefri says. Instead, it’s the worst time.

an arbitrary difference

“Afghans are angry because Syrians can get asylum in Europe, and they can’t,” said Mr. Alkhalaf, who left the Syrian capital, Damascus, to escape conflict, only to find himself facing violence after making a perilous journey to Europe. “They are going to have to be deported to Turkey, so they are making trouble.”
Nearly 1,000 Afghans and Syrians tangled during the brawl, which stretched on for six hours before the police intervened. It ended after around 800 migrants broke out of the detention center and marched in protest to the main port of this vacation destination, where many took shelter under slatternly tarps and pup tents on a vast concrete expanse.

Puerto Rico headed for July default

As the evidence mounts that Puerto Rico will fail to pay the $805 million it owes to general-obligation bondholders on July 1, the yields on some securities maturing that day have soared to almost 300 percent, data compiled by Bloomberg show. Puerto Rico Governor Alejandro Garcia Padilla on April 6 signed a law that would allow him to halt payments on the debt if necessary. The island’s Treasury Secretary, Juan Zaragoza, said there was “absolutely” no way the government will have the funds needed to avoid a July default.