Analysis: Yemen's future after the separatist STC's expansion eastwards

"Yemen's separatist Southern Transitional Council (STC) is trying to create facts on the ground with its recent advances in the country's eastern governorates of Hadramout and al-Mahra. Its military push this month highlights that Yemen's conflict ongoing for more than a decade cannot be reduced to one simply between the internationally recognised government and the Houthis. Instead, an overlapping map of influence is evident on the ground with de facto authorities competing over security, resources and representation."

"While the IMF has not publicly commented on the topic, President Rashad al-Alimi, the head of Yemen's Presidential Leadership Council, warned on Sunday that the decision was a wake-up call and an early signal of the cost of the STC's security and military escalation in Hadramout and al-Mahra. Al-Alimi stressed that Yemen's economic circumstances the country is the poorest in the region and has suffered immensely during the war cannot withstand any new tensions."

STC military advances in Hadramout and al-Mahra are intensifying fragmentation across eastern and southern Yemen. De facto authorities now overlap and compete over security, resources and representation beyond the internationally recognised government and the Houthis. The STC, backed by a regional power, has become the most powerful actor in the south and parts of the east, while the central government's capacity to impose unified administration remains weak. The Yemeni government says the IMF has suspended activities, a development framed as an early economic consequence of the eastern instability. President Rashad al-Alimi called for withdrawal of outside forces to contain tensions and restore international confidence.

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