Yemen de-facto split after Southern rebels' offensive

The Socialist Bulletin Staff - 11/12/2025

YEMEN has been rocked by military conflict again in the past week, as the United Arab Emirates-backed Southern Transitional Council (STC) and its armed wing, the Southern Armed Forces, began an offensive against the Saudi-backed government of Yemen.

The southern separatists have controlled Aden, the former capital of South Yemen, since 2018, and, despite having representation in the Presidential Leadership Council, the UN-recognised government of Yemen, tensions have been rising between them and the PLC for many years now.

On 2 December, a large-scale offensive began, with the STC aiming to capture the entirety of the former South Yemen.

This, as of today, has largely worked, and the Southern separatists now control an estimated 95% of the populated areas of Southern Yemen.

The UN-recognised PLC now controls a swiftly-shrinking area in the less-populated part of North Yemen, and today the PLC is the smallest faction by land area and population in Yemen.

While the STC has significant membership from the Yemeni Socialist Party, the former vanguard party of the working class of South Yemen, the STC is now deeply reactionary. Other than advocating separatism (advocating the creation of a so-called "State of South Arabia"), the STC is rabidly anti-Axis of Resistance, and has offered its support to the genocidal 'State' of Israel since this stage of the genocide of Palestinians began on 7 October 2023. The STC leadership has previously disavowed socialism.