31 March 2015

How Will Pakistan Respond to the Crisis in Yemen?

March 30, 2015

As Arab states head to war in Yemen, Pakistan weighs its options. 

Reports late last week in the Wall Street Journal and elsewhere suggested that Pakistan, given its close ties to Saudi Arabia, was considering its involvement in the Saudi-led campaign against the Houthi rebels in Yemen. Last week, Saudi Arabia, on the request of ousted Yemeni President Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi, initiated air strikes and a naval blockade against the Iran-backed Shia Houthi rebels who had captured the Yemeni capital of Sana’a earlier this year. The Yemeni government claimed that the Houthis were planning to overthrow the government and create a Shia state in Yemen while the Houthis see themselves as combating religious intolerance from the government.

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