Yemen continues to be a major headache and security risk for the Saudis, and rare fighting has emerged just on the kingdom’s border. Looming over the crisis is the deepening rift between Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) members Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. Saudi warplanes carried out fresh airstrikes on sites near the Saudi-Yemeni border in Yemen’s Hadramout province on Friday, as clashes erupted between forces loyal to the Saudi-backed provincial governor and fighters affiliated with the separatist Southern Transitional Council (STC). The STC has for years called the secession of a proposed federal “State of South Arabia” from the rest of the country, and is backed in this current conflict by the UAE. At lease seven air raids along the border occurred Friday, according to local officials. The STC’s leader in Wadi Hadramout, Mohammed Abdulmalik, has said that the strikes killed seven people and injured more than 20 others. Saudi-backed authorities have this week moved to reassert control over military installations in the province. Hadramout borders Saudi Arabia and thus whichever group controls the area gains great influence and strategic importance, also given it is an area rich with crude. Earlier on Friday, Yemen’s Saudi-backed government formally announced […]