based on having honest good constructive and effective interactions with the world as we consider this a win win situation useful for others and for us as well well it may result that in some exceptional situations from time to time someone may take power in a country and cause an exceptional situation these kinds of things happen on the world stage and we get past it we may have problems for two or three months but anyway we will get past the problem our basic policy of having constructive interactions is working with the world tries president xi jinping is met north korean leader kim jong un for a second time this year chinese state media reports they met in the northeastern city of dalia an earlier held talks in beijing in march and kim's first foreign trip as leader expects to meet us president donald trump later this month saudi arabia says it's trying to resolve the disagreement over a yemeni island which is occupied by troops from the united arab emirates protesters also katra in the arabian sea are demanding forces leave they arrived

last wednesday forcing out yemeni soldiers. heavy rain and aleppo province is making life even harder for people displaced by syria's war camps for internally displaced people have suffered from heavy flooding west of aleppo is one of the main destinations for people evacuated from rebel controlled areas under siege tens of thousands are living in formal and makeshift camps without access to clean water food and sanitation. that i had lines more news on al-jazeera of the inside story. the united arab emirates appears to have taken over the island of sokoto out its

troops are in key positions including the airport the islanders are staging protests demanding the soldiers leave so what does the un you want and what strivings its expansion in their region this is inside story. hello and welcome to the program that has made this public outrage on the island of so-called it's a unesco world heritage site and the people who live there don't want it to become part of the conflict in yemen bought on thursday the u.a.e. deployed troops to the island seizing strategic positions this has angered the yemeni government of president abdullah. it says it wasn't an form of the move the

u.a.e. is part of the saudi led coalition fighting houthi rebels in the country and is a former ally of had the but splits have recently emerged that reports. they're calling for troops from the united arab emirates to be the island of sequential. the people who live here say then will flee rebels and by that means you and your forces have no reason to stay in iraq this will just end up on falls they foresee altie a minute troops and taking over some strategic locations they say it's part of they'll push them to buck forces loyal to exile be a mini president of the rebel man suit huggy. so culturally is a walled heritage site known for its unique and pristine watch from bottom and it's located just off the coast of somalia with access to major shipping routes the head of a provincial council yemen cease the u.s. soldiers should leave. these forces are

present in soko in volumes that can't be understood there are illegitimate troops in these areas are there forces that belong to the who teach to be fought by the coalition here the answer is a big no. yemen swore pits iranian backed hutu the bulls and the milf against troops loyal to exile president. the u.s. part of a soda led coalition the stepped in three years ago to support hardy whose power base is in the southern city of other that's where the u.a.e. has been growing its influence funding and training armed yemeni groups now the u.a.e. is on the island of support yemen's prime minister says to deployment there is an assault on human sovereignty these protesters agree they also would much the island eunuch would be destroyed two. hundred of al-jazeera. the island of so contras the latest territory where any of our troops have been

sent as the u.a.e. expands its military presence in the horn of africa they're also deployed elsewhere across mainland yemen and had them would for example and the coastal city of addon which was recently overrun by separatists backed by the u.a.e. and emirates appear to be building an airstrip on yemen's perry island that sits right in the middle of babylon manned up straight. on the african side of the red sea the u.a.e. operates the as a naval and air base and it is fair used to support military operations in yemen for the south in somalia as breakaway region of somaliland the u.a.e. is building a military base in the coastal city of bell better without the approval of the central government there an important land another part of somalia with a self-governing status that is not internationally recognized so far the u.a.e. is building the port of bosaso and training the local maritime police force time to

bring in our guests joining us from london and dress creek specialist in the g.c.c. an assistant professor at the defense studies department at king's college and in brighton katherine shocked them middle east commentator and researcher at albion center for strategic studies a warm welcome to both of you undress triggs let me start with you what do you think are the real motive behind the u.a.e. beefing up its presence in the island of so called for. right there are a variety of different reasons i think we first of all have to kind of disconnect this current incident from what happened in the g.c.c. this is not part of the g.c.c. crisis per se although the iraqis of tried to frame it in that way i think this is part of an ongoing development that we've seen by the united arab emirates ongoing since of over the last decade really they've tried to expand their reach both

militarily and commercially into the horn of africa which has become absolutely and has always been for a very long time commercially a very interesting and important part and the control of that area control of the bubble munda straight as well as both sides of the horn of africa in east africa as well as in yemen and along the red sea coast is absolutely detrimental and important for the delivery of goods from east to west some talk about east asia towards two words europe but also it's very important for the region itself for ethiopia eritrea these countries and kenya as well are up and coming there is a lot of investments been made and they have used the ports on their own this part of obviously in east african coast and it was always important for the u.a.e. you have market themselves as a as a merchant country to basically control axes to these kind of trade routes and ensure that there is some sort of freedom of navigation in that area and they

started already in the later thousands dubai ports world for example have and has invested along the coast and there's been a couple of incidences in djibouti for example where the emirate where this immorality company was kicked out and there are immoralities started to to build turnitin across the coast so there is a military component to it which is about controlling ensuring freedom of navigation there is one which has to do with ensuring that no weapons will come to yemen and there is one much further which is about make placing the immorality strategically at the heart of international trade in this part of the world they want to be not just the primas into. ari's which they are at the moment arguably but they want to keep absolutely be the hedge i'm on in this part of the world and if you look at the way they have strategically placed these different ports and military bases this is the only explanation that there is and i think the culture of fits very nicely is a culture is much closer to the east african coast very much closer to somaliland

where already the iraqis are very much bogged down in all these areas the emirates have used surrogates and build surrogates to export and and help building their strategy and. very nicely fits in if you look at it geographically and it's much further away from yemen and it is so far off shore that it provides you with a sort of aircraft carrier capability as a guard as a guard for the access to the bubble mind up straight so it's very strategic it allows you to control trade and it does so under the umbrella of a wide operation against the of these which is obviously nonsense if you look at if you look at this kind of argument well catherine jackman now the u.s. says that it's its purpose in the courts or has been distorted mainly by the likes of the muslim brotherhood qatar turkey actually

the u.s. state minister for foreign affairs and what got a guess on social media talks about historic links between the people of the u.a.e. and sokoto what are those links and how come all of a sudden they become important now. well i think to be completely fair with you i think that what we see is growing tension between saudi arabia in the u.a.e. and it's manifesting in sokoto where there is i think of race number one as your guest mentioned in london you know full control of the waterways for very obvious geopolitical reason and then of course i think given you know certain death over the past few months and even a few years within these e.c.c. i think you stands to reason for the u.a.e. to be a little bit wary of west coming out of riyadh in terms of policies and the decisions that are being made you know when it comes to certain and alliances open friendships and so i do see you know these efforts encircled that are you know yes it has been blown out of proportion because it has been politically played out in

the you know the government of haiti is not being very genuine from completely honest i think in towards their position towards the u.a.e. because only just a few years ago back into science fourteen for example it was quite happy to welcome the u.n. not just in support of but as well in adam in the support of art and so i think that what we see us just you know growing tension in between as you mentioned certain powers we've been maybe the middle east but i don't think it has anything to do with the muslim brotherhood per se i think it has everything to do with your hovel and how the u.a.e. is trying to break away i think from you know this you know this from a german that is saudi arabia right now in the region and they're trying to be a bit more independent and if we recall what happened with qatar trying to do the same thing to try to actually pursue independent policies and trying to assert itself as an independent power within the region and the international community i think that is kind of running a. campaign against you trying to mr trey you do you raising tension or maybe

trying to utilize this to its benefit and trying to to to get things out of context i'm not justifying the position of the u.n. support i'm just trying to give some context to it and the reason why today it's being criticized i thing. there's a great degree of hypocrisy. on the part of heidi and saudi arabia as with the u.a.e. i mean we have to understand that as a sovereign nation they're going to do what they see as in their best interest and i think controlling sick without the support of i don't and having a very heavy presence in the horn of africa makes sense from a you a perspective you know one says blown out of proportion distorted very nice words but you do have sixty thousand residents on the island and many of them went down to the street denouncing what they see as every iraqi ok patient of the island is it an occupation in your view catherine. yes i think it is i mean to go from i mean you have to remember that yemen is

a sovereign nation and so its people have rights and if a nation is in fact imposing you know whatever whether it's military or you know otherwise its presence is forced onto a nation then yes it is not just an occupation but it's actually an octal war technically speaking and so i did again i'm not justifying the u.a.e. at all because i do think that at the end of the day the people of yemen have a right to decide you know who is who is allowed in there you know within their territory and their borders and i think that the u.a.e. actually broke the law international law here and so you know the so we need to be discussed but the problem that i have is that you know this occupation this particular key patient is not talked about from the yemeni perspective but rather from a political perspective whereas you know the saudis are using this as a munition in a way against the u.a.e. and i think we need to consider that it might be a proxy here you know there are tensions going in between the u.a.e. and saudi arabia. is collateral damage really but i think it falls to within a move region or kind of race to control you know these particular region here

because for obvious reason commercial reasons military reasons and of course you know this is the man dab and the fact that you know it's the world or root and it's very important and whoever will control it will control not the fate of the world but we have quite heavy on international relations will go into what's happening within the saudi led coalition the moment but i want to put the same question to you and risk rig do you view the presence of iraq two soldiers in. as an occupation and also in the long run i mean do you ease a rich country but relatively small militarily not very strong is it sustainable. well i mean is the entire strategy of the iraqis sustainable at the moment i think they're punching way above their weight they have tried to translate their soft power into increasingly into hard power we have to say the iraqi military is probably the most effective one in the region at the moment considering its size

and also in comparison to the saudis and that's why there is this kind of dependency coming along where the saudis knew in twenty fifteen that they couldn't run this war without iraq the support the iraqi were absolutely crucial in this but the immoralities didn't see at the time in twenty fifteen who these as an existential threat to their security but it was an existential threat to saudi security so the saudis need to provide the emirates with some sort of goody to make them to make them come along and it was quite it became quite clear early on that at that time it was still working for the country military and you know i was. on a daily basis with the saudi military as well we could see quite quickly already in twenty fifteen that the immoralities were pushing their own agenda in the south trying to secure their access to the red sea and they kind of refrained from getting bogged down or dragged into the war in the north which is a separate conflict from what was going on in the south and what we've seen and this is very important to bear in mind here is there is a larger pattern emerging the immoralities have tried to use try buildings to and

also secessionist movements within the country like the arcology nobody in the south of yemen and form this new surrogate in the south that has moved against the how the government there the problem with that is that the hardy government invited the coalition which was saudi led to come to yemen in twenty fifteen now the iraqis came along on this invitation and they were invited to come along there is a debate to be had whether the hardy government had the authority to invite anybody along under international law considering how divided the country was but the immoralities came along under the invitation of the hardy government as the internationally recognized government and under the premise that they were fighting the who these and terrorism in the country this occurred trial and. has nothing to do with that invitation has nothing to do with that kind of policy and has nothing to do with that objective so it's not it's something that cannot be argued and justified under international law saying that there's

a justification to come along and what their marauders are doing now very much moves against the saudi interests the fact that saudis were on the island a couple of days ago trying to reconcile with local tribal leaders for example suggests that the saudis are very concerned that the emirates are pursuing their interest in yemen at the expense of the saudis which in twenty fifteen twenty sixteen the saudis were ok that the emirates were pursuing their own national interest as long as they were serving the overall coalition interests where we stand today it seems that this the immoralities of achieve their objective in the south and they are not that inclined to help on the massive scale or the saudis out as they might have done in earlier years and that really puts into question this saudi led coalition many would argue it hasn't achieved much so far in the end of conflict in yemen and where is it going from there so now you have to choose major countries participating in that coalition catherine saudi is still trying to

support president had he the un he seems to have dropped him basically are mean having your own troops. sort of keeping hostage for a while or not allowing a prime minister of a country to leave an island is quite a bold move so what's how will all of this impact the main conflict that is going on in the mainland. but i think it's going to definitely have a great impact in those towns as you mentioned before yemen is broken up you know along so many lines so you have the north and the south if you really want to simplify things and then of course the u.a.e. spearing heavy in the cells and this i would you have relied heavily if not completely on the u.a.e. to be running you know the complaint if you want to call it that so this is going to complicate things because the saudi now cannot count on the u.a.e. to actually be a long line they're going to be running their own agenda are they going to be running their own policies in yemen possibly even backing or even talking their own

peace if you really want to take it a step further and i think that it's going to put this out in a very difficult situation because they don't really have any backup or even any real say in terms of you know had his popularity in yemen which is almost nonexistent so they're backing you know not not just the backing the wrong horse if i can put it that way we had to say is going to make things very difficult because not only do they have to maybe look somewhere else to try to find you know another ally to kind of you know their troops and their position in the war in yemen they bring in mind that the u.a.e. might actually completely break away from this and actually run their own policy parallel to that of saudi arabia and they might actually you know their agenda might actually clash in terms of what is it that they want to see you chief and i think that the u.a.e. is actually more invested in brokering a peace with yemen because as you said they don't look upon the resistance movement in yemen to hooty as an example of threat to the own government and i think that there's a common interest in running against the muslim brotherhood when it comes to the

hootie and the u.a.e. so they might have more common ground than you know maybe difficulty in the saudis and so it would make things quite interesting to see how peace might actually brokered away from saudi arabia even though the saudi all the ones who declare war on yemen essentially you know back into silence fifteen so i think it's putting the saudi on you know on the wrong foot here and i'm not surprised because from the very beginning of this fool when even even more so lately at. that reacts policy has been a little bit erratic and they're not trying to see the bigger picture or trying to understand the consequences that their choices we have short to me term an even longer term and i think that the u.a.e. has a better understanding of this of the dynamic you know whether geopolitical or even social within yemen the horn of africa and the greater region as a whole so i think is going to be quite interesting because i think what you see today is actually a growing rivalry between riyadh and i would be and i think that we will have the upper hand and yes it is a small country you know money speaks louder and today i think that in terms of

military power how it is exerted unmanifested on the ground you know the use of mercenary armies is actually quite the way forward night scenes so it's it could be possible that the u.e.c. you know their their presence to be you know the use of mercenary armies and maybe to to use other technical other diplomatic tools to exert influence on to contrie which in the long term is actually much much more useful and a bit cleverer than what reality trying to do at the current moment so it's definitely very interesting and if we we heavy on yemen i believe that certainly the relations between saudi arabia and the emirates is something that one will have to look closely at in the coming weeks and months but going back to what you were saying earlier. about all the economic side of the u.s. the let's say expansion or involvement in the gulf of aden. being in the middle of

this very important international shipping route while actually the saudis let the whole gulf be taken over by the in the rockies and they just sit and watch while all this economic potential is just taken away from them will they let that slip away from them. i'm going to do the saudis have a choice is the question i mean i wouldn't say that there is a rift developing between with abbey and riyadh it's not a rift per se there is a grand strategic alliance evolves ideologically but we have to assert as well that might have been said among the crown prince and supposedly new ruler of saudi arabia is very much in a junior all virt visibly mama bin zeid who is the ruler and crown prince of the united arab emirates the u.a.e. have actually a strategy and a strategy that they have developed over at least fifteen years strategic thinking means that you that you are in there for the long run you have the ways and the

means to secure your strategic objectives and the iraqis for the most part of actually have that the saudis don't have a real strategy they have some objectives they have known there are very few means and they have no ways to actually achieve them in that way they are and they're trapped in this junior role also in that respect they the saudis are not looking at exercising real power whether soft or hard power outside their borders they've tried in lebanon and failed they tried in qatar and they failed they're trying in yemen and they're failing and i agree with catherine to a point the u.a.e. have more strategically invested is similar like iran does by the way invested strategically into the social politics of the southern provinces of yemen they have build a movement from the bottom up rather than from the top down the saudis what they usually do is they go into a country they try to pay one proxy and then when the proxy doesn't work for them anymore they pay the opposite side if you look at the yemen conflict saudi over the

years and over the decades have been on all sides of the conflict whether with royalists or republicans whether with southerners or northerners whether with tribal forces with jihadists you name it even with the muslim brotherhood now the emirates is have chosen a side in their building this side and they're doing it somewhat at a as i said at the expense of. the saudis and also the emirate is a realize that the goal of the persian gulf is less important in the long run then the indian ocean bubble manda in the long run the persian gulf particular because we see a withdrawal from the west we see a withdrawal of also of some of the oil and gas interests in the gulf i think if you look purely at the trade routes i would say that the indian ocean more generally not just bubbling under but the extensive region or of the indian ocean is becoming increasingly important as pakistan is rising and india is rising china is rising so we have this pivot towards asia overall in terms of geopolitics so it's very important for the

a mirage to be part of this and they realize this all smaller g.c.c. countries by the way do this the countries as well they're investing very heavily in east asia because that's where the future is saudi arabia somewhat has missed this train the saudis have bought into america and that continue to be to buy into america and they don't realize that actually in front of their doorstep there's a lot more to be done but they are as i said the saudi have no strategy and they've been constantly outmaneuvered by those powers that have a strategy certainly it's a culture is a place many will be looking at closely and wondering if at some point it will. fall into this yemeni conflict or not but we have reached the end of this conversation so it'll be fun another time thank you to our guests and miscreate and katherine check them and thank you for watching you can see the program again any time by visiting our website al-jazeera dot com and for further discussion go to our facebook page that's facebook dot com forward slash a.j.

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