The governor of Yemeni Socotra, Ramzi Mahrous, said that an Emirati ship landed in the archipelago port of military vehicles, describing this as a flagrant challenge to the legitimate government and local authorities, and a clear attempt to obstruct the implementation of the Riyadh Agreement.
Mahrous said that the arrival of these vehicles to Socotra on Thursday is evidence of the activities taking place in the archipelago to destabilize security, create chaos and confiscate the governorate’s decision and sovereignty with external support, as he put it.
He accused the UAE of continuing to support armed groups and the militia of the Southern Transitional Council and encouraging the chaos in the archipelago.
The governor held the Saudi-Emirati coalition fully responsible for what is happening in Socotra, stressing the need to fulfill the commitments it had previously made to solve the problem.
The Saudi-Emirati coalition announced at the end of July 2020 a mechanism to accelerate the implementation of the Riyadh agreement - concluded in November 2019 - that includes the abandonment of the UAE-backed Southern Transitional Council of the Autonomous Administration that it had announced in the southern governorates.
Officials, tribal elders and activists express their concerns about the continuation of the moves aimed, according to them, to place Socotra under the tutelage of the Emirates, despite the guarantees requested by the Yemeni President Abd Rabbu Mansour Hadi from Saudi Arabia, the sponsor of the Riyadh agreement to implement the modified agreement by the Southern Transitional Council.