What Yemen—Gate to Asia, points to ?

19:37, January 26, 2010

By Li Hongmei People's Daily Online

A Chinese diplomat long stationed in Sana'a, Capital of Yemen, once described Yemen as the Gate to Asia, and the reason, he explained, was that 60% of China's imported energy would come by the Gulf of Aden, astride it being Yemen and Somalia. Viewed from geopolitical prism, the strategic point of Yemen is beyond any doubt. If Yemen fell into chaos as Somalia does, it would not only endanger China's energy import, but pose a direct threat to the U.S. and all the other countries who have long and heavily relied on petroleum from Middle East countries.

Also, once crisis broke out in Yemen, the neighboring Egypt would feel the bite, as the ship traffic through the Suez Canal would be largely reduced. This would fatally affect the river's position of servicing the world trade, severely derailing Egypt's national economy. Now, with the impoverished country in the Middle East seemingly on the verge of becoming the world's next ‘failed state” and another hotbed for al-Qaeda, Yemen has suddenly moved in the limelight of the world attention. Many countries, developed as well as developing ones, express the similar concerns to the otherwise obscure place---could it fall into the hands of terrorists?

The crystal clear fact is that al-Qaeda are now back in Yemen in snowballing numbers and the extremist organization is flourishing in a society which is already overwhelmed with daunting social and security problems. What is of particular concern to Western powers is the composition of al-Qaeda's leadership in Yemen.

Head of Yemen-based al-Qaeda groups, Saed Ali al-Shihri, a Saudi national, spent six years at the U.S.-run Guantanamo prison in Cuba after being captured on the Pakistan-Afghanistan border in 2001. He was then released under the custody of a Saudi rehab program in 2007. But he quit the program within two months and, in 2008, he sneaked into Yemen and started to set up a new organization----al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsular (AQAP). It is this al-Shihri and his AQAP who claimed responsibility for the botched suicide bombing on board a Detroit-bound flight on the Christmas Day just gone by.

Western intelligence agencies have since come to some consensus that the operating al-Qaeda groups in Yemen, though ill-trained, will come around in the coming years as a major threat, and Yemen, one of the poorest countries in the region, has now become the third-largest haven for al-Qaeda immediately following Iraq and Afghanistan-Pakistan border. The U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton even labeled Yemen as an incubator of extremism in her remarks on the issue this week.

But the opinions are just torn among the U.S. politicians on whether to open up the fourth counter-terror front line in Yemen. Some hold it is not at all worthwhile plunging troops into such a morass like Yemen, which sees no resources, nor strategic position. But others including Ms. Clinton deem that the cost of doing nothing is potentially far greater.

British PM Gordon Brown has called a Jan. 28 aid conference on Yemen in London at which the U.K. hopes to enlist support from oil-rich Gulf nations. Many diplomats in Sana'a, representing their own countries, also express their willingness to help Yemeni authorities who are fighting terrorism develop means. To this, Yemeni government responds it welcomes economic and constructive aid in any form from the international community, but it will firmly offend to the direct military intervention.

Additionally, it is reported by Yemen Post newspaper that the Yemeni government has already officially appealed for economic help from China and Russia.

Compared with making the plausible statement that Yemen is the budding terror hotbed or tends to be tomorrow's Afghanistan, keeping it in order and stable is more important. And compared with sending 30,000 troops to Yemen, a better and wiser counter-terror strategy is more effective. Please focus on Yemen's need today.

The articles in this column represent the author's views only. They do not represent opinions of People's Daily or People's Daily Online.