JTIC Feature: Middle East

End of an emirate?
In June, Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) was finally ousted from territory it had controlled in southern Yemen for more than a year, but the risk of a resurgence of militant Islamist violence in the region remains. Iona Craig reports from Abyan.

Key points
For the past year, the Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) front organisation Ansar al-Sharia has been the de facto authority in a number of towns in southern Yemen. Although ousted in a May-June government offensive, the group was not militarily defeated and it is unclear whether AQAP has abandoned its ambition of governing territory. The risk of an AQAP resurgence in southern Yemen is exacerbated by the governments poor record of governance in the region and its reliance on irregular militias to maintain security.

n June 2012, Yemens government declared victory over Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP). The groups insurgent wing, Ansar al-Sharia, had been driven from the four towns it had occupied in the southern governorate of Abyan, while AQAP itself had been ousted from its long-time home of Azzan in neighbouring Shabwah governorate. In recent years, AQAPs domestic and international operations have gained it a reputation as the most capable and effective of Al-Qaedas affiliates, but following this setback it now finds itself at an unprecedented crossroads and probably a defining moment in its history. While a spate of terrorist operations targeting Yemeni security forces in July and August suggests that AQAP has reverted to familiar guerrilla tactics, it remains possible that the group will continue to try to pursue its 2011 policy of territorial control and governance, and a resurgence in southern Yemen cannot be ruled out.

Partisans of Sharia
In 2011, a new branch of Yemens notorious AQAP network emerged. The name

Ansar al-Sharia (Partisans of Sharia) was first acknowledged in April of that year by AQAPs head religious cleric, Abu Zubayr Adl al-Abab. In an audio report, Abu Zubayr stated: The mujahideen in Yemen are known as part of Al-Qaeda. The name Ansar al-Sharia is what we use to introduce ourselves in areas where we work to tell people about our work and goals, and that we are on the path of Allah. By late May 2011, while the rest of the country, including Yemens security forces, was embroiled in an increasingly violent popular uprising, the newly branded insurgents controlled three towns in Abyan: Jaar, Ar Rawdah and Zinjibar. Jaar was renamed the Islamic Emirate of Waqar and the town became the central focus for the insurgents, who moved their families in to live alongside the local population. In a self-proclaimed Taliban-style attempt to govern, Ansar al-Sharia set about winning over local residents by providing basic services, such as electricity, water, food for the poor, and most notably for local residents, security and a justice system. Speaking days after the recapture of Jaar by government forces in June 2012, a resident told IHS Janes: Before Ansar al-Sharia, there was no security. Armed thugs ran Jaar and everyone was afraid. The ease with which the militants were able to gain control of territory, including the provincial capital Zinjibar, became the subject of much political debate. Yemens then president Ali Abdullah Saleh was accused by his political opponents of allowing the insurgents to overrun swathes of Abyan in a political move to divert attention from security crackdowns on unarmed protesters and spread fear among his Western sponsors. As Saleh repeatedly claimed throughout 2011, as protests against his 33-year-rule spread: It is either me or Al-Qaeda. If I leave, who will stop the march of Al-Qaeda? Notably, Zinjibar fell from government control on the same day in May 2011 as

Yemens security forces were storming an anti-government protest camp 153 km away in the city of Taiz. While around 200 militants were reported to have occupied Zinjibar, after the city was liberated by government forces in June, residents who witnessed the jihadist takeover a year before told IHS Janes that the initial assault had been carried out by only a handful of militants. One resident, who asked not to be named, said: Just four gunmen attacked the military camp at first. There were clashes that day and night and then everyone left. The governor and government officials, they just left us.

Crackdown
In May 2012, President Abdurabu Mansour al-Hadi who had been sworn in as Salehs successor in February launched a major offensive targeting AQAP. In mid-June, following heavy fighting in Zinjibar and on the outskirts of the other towns held by Ansar al-Sharia, the jihadists abandoned their positions, bringing to an end their more than 12 month rule in southern Yemen. However, the group was not militarily defeated, having apparently decided against mounting an allout defence of its territory. In Jaar, Ansar al-Sharia distributed leaflets before its departure, claiming its forces were leaving to avoid civilian casualties. According to local accounts, Ansar al-Sharia withdrew following negotiations with local tribes, and when IHS Janes visited the newly liberated town three days after Ansar al-Sharia had fled, there were no visible signs of a final battle. They came by a phone call and left by a phone call, one resident told IHS Janes. In the city of Azzan, in neighbouring Shabwah governorate, the negotiated settlement between tribal leaders and the jihadists was more openly admitted. Once the tribal leaders saw pictures [on state television] after Zinjibar had been liberated, of the destruction from all the air strikes, they did not want that to happen in Azzan, so they asked
ihs.com/janes

12 | Janes Terrorism & Insurgency Monitor September 2012

JTIC Feature: Middle East

Al-Qaeda to leave, a government official told IHS Janes in June. Around 1,000 insurgents survived the recent military offensive, a Yemeni security official told IHS Janes in July. Now dispersed through several provinces, some have regrouped in the area of Mahfad in the provincial border region of Abyan and Shabwah. Others have merged back into the local populations they were recruited from. As such, an Ansar al-Sharia resurgence remains a possibility. However, whether the group will be able to regroup and recapture the territory it has lost will depend largely on the extent to which security forces can reestablish basic security in Abyan, the level of popular support Ansar al-Sharia has been able to cultivate during its period of governance, and the size and capabilities of any covert presence it has been able to maintain in the towns it previously controlled. Jaar remains particularly vulnerable. When IHS Janes visited in June, the black flags used by AQAP and Ansar al-Sharia were still flying in the main street and a large banner across the road leading into the town welcoming new arrivals to The Islamic Emirate of Waqar had yet to be removed. Meanwhile, defaced advertising billboards showing pictures of women wearing headscarves with their eyes blacked out testified to the strict interpretation of sharia (Islamic law) implemented during the militants rule. Jaar and Zinjibar residents claim many of the militants never left, but rather blended back into their local communities, preserving a clandestine Ansar al-Sharia presence. Residents also allege that some of the more opportunistic militants simply switched sides and joined government-sponsored local militias, known as Popular Committees. Untrained and unaccountable, numbering several thousand strong, these Popular Committees are comprised of a potentially dangerous cocktail of tribal groups, armed thugs, secessionists and apparent Ansar alSharia defectors. I know members of the Popular Committees who were with Ansar al-Sharia. But they are for sale. They go where there is money, Zinjibar resident and farmer, Dayood Salem Saleh, told IHS Janes. I would not trust the Popular Committees to watch over my goats. The Popular Committees were used extensively in the recent military offensive and are now responsible for maintaining security in the formerly Ansar al-Sharia-held towns
ihs.com/janes

Yemeni militiamen of the Popular C ommittees in Lawdar, Abyan, following its recapture from Ansar al-Sharia in June 2012.
PA: 1339629

and the surrounding roads. Indeed, when IHS Janes visited the towns of Zinjibar, Jaar and Shuqrah in June, there was no observable conventional Yemeni military presence. The extent to which the government is relying on the Popular Committees to secure and hold the towns formerly held by Ansar al-Sharia is a concern. With the exception of the strongly secessionist town of Lawdar, the government supported gunmen have been met with suspicion and distrust by local residents, and this risks compromising government attempts to re-establish its role as the legitimate authority in the region. I would rather Ansar al-Sharia than the Popular Committees, Jaar lawyer Fouad Zaid

al-Qasem told IHS Janes on 16 June, adding: Armed thugs ruled the town before Ansar al-Sharia. That is why we welcomed the security Ansar al-Sharia brought. Now they [the thugs] have come back as the Popular Committees. Just renamed, with their own agenda.

Competing governance
The allegations levelled at former president Saleh that he was using Al-Qaeda as a political tool have not transferred to his successor. Since assuming office, Hadi has repeatedly stressed his commitment to crushing Al-Qaeda in Yemen and has strengthened relations with the United States. However,

September 2012 Janes Terrorism & Insurgency Monitor | 13

JTIC Feature: Middle East

the extent to which Hadi can translate his early successes against Ansar al-Sharia into sustainable security gains in southern Yemen will depend on more than continued military operations, with his ability to establish state control through effective governance key to preventing AQAP from re-establishing itself. Southern Yemen has been neglected by successive governments over several decades. Basic services are either non-existent or grossly unreliable, while security has been left to local militia groups and corrupt officials. As a result, Ansar al-Sharias task of proving its form of governance was better than state control was relatively easy. According to local residents, new recruits were paid twice as much as government troops, an effective justice system based on a strict interpretation of sharia was set up, electricity and water supplies were handled by the insurgents, while people who lost their houses to airstrikes were well compensated. Those residents that told IHS Janes they remained sympathetic with Ansar al-Sharia cited these benefits when explaining why they had preferred the jihadists regime over state rule. They claimed Ansar al-Sharia had been able to resolve problems, such as long-running land disputes, that the government and its ineffective justice system had consistently failed to do. Ansar al-Sharia have solved many problems for us that the government had not managed to do for 20 years, a resident from Jaar said. Historically AQAP, unlike its counterpart in Iraq, has avoided direct attacks against Yemeni civilians. Ansar al-Sharia continued this strategy and successfully won over local populations, despite the harsh penalties that characterised the interpretation of sharia it implemented in its areas of control. Amputations for those accused of stealing were carried out in Jaar, as well as public beheadings of men accused of being government spies. Nevertheless, the group also demonstrated pragmatism in its approach to implementing law and order, as with its decision to banish the sale of the widely popular mild narcotic plant qat to the outside of the town rather than simply banning it altogether. After a year being governed by Ansar alSharia, it is critical that Hadis administration demonstrates it can address the deficiencies in local governance that previously characterised government rule during the Saleh era and which facilitated Ansar al-Sharias original takeover. We hope that the state will fix these problems, that they will bring to receive their government pay, increasing their vulnerability to being co-opted by the insurgents.

Strategic considerations
AQAPs leader Nasir al-Wuhayshi remains the final decision-maker on whether the group continues to pursue a strategy focused on making territorial gains and establishing local governance structures, having previously demonstrated his willingness to deviate from the directives issued by Al-Qaedas central leadership in Afghanistan/Pakistan. According to documents recovered during the May 2011 raid in which Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden was killed, Wuhayshis original decision to pursue a territorial-based strategy went against Bin Ladens expressed wishes. Furthermore, following the capture of Jaar, Wuhayshi defied Bin Ladens request not to name an Islamic state in Abyan. Wuhayshi has also continued to disregard Bin Ladens directive that AQAP focus its efforts on attacking the US, and not target [Yemeni] military and police officers in their centers, as the group has done on a growing scale since this Mays military offensive against Ansar al-Sharia began. AQAP claimed responsibility for a particularly deadly such attack on 21 May, when a suicide bomber killed at least 120 soldiers and wounded more than 350 others during a rehearsal for a military parade in Sanaa. Yemeni Al-Qaeda expert and author of a book on Al-Qaedas history in Yemen, Saeed al-Jemhi interviewed by IHS Janes on 17 July suggested that Ansar al-Sharia was Wuhayshis attempt to fight the near enemy after failing to reach the far enemy embodied by the US. The separation of Ansar al-Sharia from AQAP both in name and in direct day-to-day control Ansar al-Sharia is headed by Abyan native and so-called Emir of Abyan, Jalal al-Balayidi al-Zinjubari (alias Abu Hamza al-Murqoshi) means the central core of AQAP and individuals such as Wuhayshi, deputy head Said Ali al-Shihri and military commander Qasim al-Raymi, remain able to distance themselves from any failure of the Ansar al-Sharia project. This separation also allows the AQAP leadership to remain physically removed from any air strikes against the insurgents, as well as from the ongoing fighting with government troops and the Popular Committees. Jemhi believes control of territory in Abyan is likely to remain Ansar al-Sharias goal. Like the Aden-Abyan Islamic Army (AAIA), which
ihs.com/janes

A resident of Zinjibar in Yemens Abyan governorate stands in the wreckage of his house, destroyed in an air strike during a government offensive to recapture the town in June 2012.
PA: 1339631

the rule of law and order, not like before when there was no security, the imam of the central mosque in Jaar, Saleem Mohammed al-Subayhi, told IHS Janes after the town was recaptured in June. However, in the foreseeable future this objective is likely to be undermined by the governments reliance on the Popular Committees to maintain security. In conversation with IHS Janes in June, Sheikh Ahmed Hussein al-Fadhli a senior member of the AlFadhli clan that ruled Abyan for around 500 years until 1967 and the cousin of prominent former jihadist Tareq al-Fadhli pointed to the long history of Yemeni mercenaries and guns for hire and why the Popular Committees should not be trusted. As the Yemeni saying goes: I belong to no tribe and I have no country, no master. I only answer to Mother Theresa, Fadhli said, referring to the historical Empress Maria Theresa thaler silver bullion coin, previously used as currency in Yemen. Even as a Sheikh of Abyan I do not know who these men are, where they are from, who they answer to. I do not trust them and nobody else should. Especially not the government, he warned. In addition to their questionable capabilities and loyalties, the Popular Committees are also vulnerable to infiltration and manipulation by Ansar al-Sharia. People in Abyan told IHS Janes the militants paid new recruits USD400 per month, more than double the wage of a regular Yemeni soldier, while Popular Committee members interviewed recently said they were still waiting

14 | Janes Terrorism & Insurgency Monitor September 2012

JTIC Feature: Middle East

military restructuring plans to resolve the issue of Yemens divided army, which split during last years uprising, but former president Salehs family members still control elite units and Saleh himself retains considerable influence and support within the Yemeni military. Nevertheless, the chances of Ansar alSharia recapturing territory and then maintaining and expanding control beyond a hub such as Jaar remains highly unlikely unless they are able to significantly increase their membership and secure access to the kind of large-scale and regular funding required to govern towns and provide effective services. Jaar residents described to IHS Janes how the militants used cash US dollars and Saudi riyals to fund their activities during their administration and the groups ambition to establish a functioning emirate is heavily dependent on its ability to generate such funds from wealthy donors, as well as from the kind of criminal activities such as bank robberies it has carried out in the past. Ansar al-Sharias ambitions are also challenged by the increased involvement of the US since May 2011, when unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) strikes were resumed in Yemen after a year-long absence. However, while the US role in the fight against AQAP has been cemented since Hadi came to power in February, AQAPs senior leaders have so far evaded the air strikes. Despite the successful targeting of US-born AQAP ideologue Anwar al-Awlaqi in September 2011, Wuhayshi, Shihri, Raymi, and chief bomb-maker Ibrahim Hassan al-Asiri have yet to be killed. While these men continue to guide AQAP and its auxiliary Ansar al-Sharia, the group will remain a threat to stability in Yemen. Furthermore, until the state can address the deficient security and governance that characterises its administration of southern Yemen and Abyan in particular, Ansar al-Sharia is likely to be able to maintain the popular support it garnered from local populations during its period of governance. As such, despite the recent successes enjoyed by the government, towns in Abyan province remain acutely vulnerable to an Ansar al-Sharia resurgence.

A Yemeni soldier, who fought against Ansar al-Sharia, stands next to a tank captured by government forces after it ran out of fuel during a military offensive in June 2012.
PA: 1339812

preceded the existence of AQAP in Yemen, Ansar al-Sharia frequently cites a hadith (sayings and actions attributed to the Prophet Muhammad), which predicts the creation of a mujahideen army in Abyan: Out of Aden-Abyan will come 12,000, giving victory to the [religion of] Allah and His Messenger. They are the best between me and them. This prophecy is central to the ideology of jihadists in southern Yemen and Jemhi thinks Ansar al-Sharia remains committed to fulfilling it, saying: They will continue if possible because they believe there should be a land for them to base themselves and spread out from. In the meantime, ambushes, assassinations and suicide bombings against Yemeni military and government targets have become a near daily occurrence across Yemen since Ansar al-Sharia fled towns in Abyan and Shabwah in mid-June. Seemingly intended as revenge attacks for the recent military offensive, these operations indicate that in the short-term at least AQAP has reverted to its pre-2011 use of terrorist and guerrilla tactics, but on a larger scale than before. Consequently, the security threat posed by the group has become more distributed and has spread beyond Abyan, with regular attacks being carried out in Hadhramaut, Aden and Sanaa. Within Abyan itself, the focus of AQAPs campaign in recent weeks has been the Popular Committees. Notably, on 4 August, 45 men were killed by a suicide bomber at a funeral on the edge of Jaar at the home of Abdul Latif al-Sayed, leader of the Popular Committees. Some local press reports claimed Sayed, who survived the attack, had previously been an Ansar al-Sharia member, although these allegations were not substantiated.
ihs.com/janes

Prospects
The lack of military presence and the reliance on the Popular Committees in former Ansar al-Sharia held towns raises doubts over the long-term prospect of preventing the militants from regaining control. In the short-term, the fight against Ansar al-Sharia and AQAP has switched back to an asymmetric war, but on a larger and so far much more deadly scale than before. A day after Ansar al-Sharias departure from Jaar and Zinjibar, it released a statement vowing to take the battle to quick operations and painful strikes in the cities of the enemy and its capitals. Currently Yemen is experiencing the results of that promise. Since May, multiple suicide bombings and car bomb attacks have killed security officials and senior commanders. Particularly notable was the 18 June assassination of General Salem Ali Qatan, who led the southern forces against Ansar al-Sharia. Meanwhile, the attacks targeting the local Popular Committees suggest Ansar al-Sharia has not given up hope of re-occupying its Waqar emirate. It is likely that this renewed guerrilla campaign has benefited from AQAP infiltration of Yemens security structures. Yemeni officials have expressed concern that the countrys intelligence organisations the National Security Bureau and in particular the Political Security Organisation (PSO) have been deeply infiltrated by Al-Qaeda members or sympathisers. As one PSO officer in the southern city of Aden described to IHS Janes in June: Al-Qaeda passes through the PSO like this, as he picked up a handful of sand and allowed it to drain through his open fingers. Loyalties also remain divided in Yemens security forces. Hadi has recently put in place

On the web... AQAPs Yemeni takeover, Janes Terrorism and Security Monitor, 14 December 2011. ihs.com/janes

September 2012 Janes Terrorism & Insurgency Monitor | 15