- Iran, the Houthis, AQAP, and Al-Shabab are the principal losers from the Southern Transitional Council’s takeover of Hadramawt and Mahra, the last two provinces that had remained outside its control.
With these areas now liberated, those networks have been cut off from some of their most critical weapons-and drug-smuggling corridors, long used to funnel Iranian arms, narcotics, and other illicit goods.
Equally reassuring for the Horn of Africa is the STC’s parallel campaign to dismantle AQAP remnants in Abyan province,an area that for years functioned as a key logistical hub feeding Al-Shabab’s supply chains.
Gulf states,particularly Saudi Arabia,should not succumb to Houthi blackmail, but instead welcome and consolidate these developments, which directly enhance regional security and weaken Iran’s destabilizing footprint across the Red Sea and the Horn of Africa.
✍️/ Yusuf Gabobe
