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Yemen: New report analyses manipulation of conflict and fragility before donors

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Yemen
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Clingendael
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Under the influence of the Arab Spring, Yemen last year embarked on a political transition after decades of autocratic rule under President Ali Abdullah Saleh. The extreme fragility of the Yemeni state, however, stems from numerous sources of instability and discontent, which the upheavals in palace politics in the capital seem unable to resolve. With its strategic location, various zones of internal armed conflict, an Islamist terrorist threat, ongoing humanitarian crises, scarcity of key resources such as water, and the world’s worst gender imbalance, the country remains a source of acute international concern.

However, the apparent fragility of the Yemeni state should not be understood merely as the product of a fragmented, tribal population living in poverty. The country’s politics, before and after reunification of north and south in 1990, have been dominated by elite factions manipulating shifting groups of clients based on tribal or sectarian loyalties. In the process, deep grievances and disaffection with the state have festered. While political transition and the accompanying Gulf Initiative are welcome, they are likely to generate further pressures towards secession and armed rebellion unless they address the deep structural sources of state weakness, namely the strategic political use of difference, as well as the manipulation of conflict and fragility before donors so as to favour the interests of the country’s leadership.