The Security Belt Forces (Quwat al-Hizam al-Amni) has emerged as one of the key internal security forces in parts of southern Yemen that are outside of Houthi control, including the important port city of Aden. The Security Belt Forces has been supported by the United Arab Emirates. To learn more about the Security Belt Forces and its importance in Aden, I conducted an exclusive interview on 19 July 2019 with Wadah Omar Abd al-Aziz, who is the head of the Security Belt Forces in Aden.
Q: What is the Security Belt Forces?
A: The Security Belt Forces is a military force established by the forces of the Arab Coalition and under their direct supervision, including in its composition all the sects of the Southern Resistance that resisted and routed the fascist-Houthi forces from the southern regions, and it is a pure southern force.
Q: What is the aim of establishing the Security Belt Forces by the forces of the Arab Coalition in particular in the capital Aden?
A: The Security Belt Forces was established in coordination with the leadership of the Resistance that believes in liberation and independence. This was so after the victory that the forces of the Southern Resistance, supported by the forces of the Arab Coalition, achieved in cutting the arms of Iran from the southern regions: something that caused a huge shock for some of the parties and states supporting terrorism and worked to support and mobilize their sleeper cells and terrorist groups for the purpose of bringing down Aden in the morass of the Da'eshi Ikhwani Caliphate in an attempt to show the states of the coalition are weak and incapable of securing the liberated areas.
Q: What is the role that the Belt forces has played alongside the security and is there any coordination between the two apparatuses in combating terrorism and establishing security in the capital Aden?
A: Regarding the Security Belt, it is an indivisible part of the security of Aden as it receives directives from the Aden security director the general Shalal Ali Sha'i the planner and father-leader in the battle against terrorism. Indeed dozens of martyrs have fallen from the Security Belt, whether in car bombs, IEDs or being taken by hands of treachery in order to deter them from undertaking the duty and defending the homeland.
Q: What are the security centres that the sister Arab Emirates state have re-established from all the districts?
A: It is well known that the sister Emirates state is the state of Zayed al-Khayr. The blood of its sons has been mixed with the southern blood in the war against the Houthis and the terrorist groups. The Emirates has rebuilt and renovate all the security apparatuses and generously supported them from all angles and in all fields: building and renovating the police forces and training their members, which met great approval from the citizens. It also established a counter-terrorism apparatus that has dealt a blow to terrorism with international acknowledgements of the allied and fulfilling sincerity of the southern forces. It has also renovated the prisons and generously supported them and transferred them to the field of reforms that rehabilitate the prisons and move them from the life of depression to human and humanitarian life. In short, the state of the Emirates has re-established and rehabilitated the army and southern security in all the southern regions and supported them with equipment and ammunition.
Q: After the framework of the security apparatuses and police centres was reformed and the two undertook their assignments, what is the role of the Security Belt in this present time of ours and in particular in the capital Aden?
A: The Security Belt Forces is the force present on the ground in the security points and border crossings and the smuggling routes. They have participated to a large extent in eliminating the phenomenon of smuggling in the form of trucks of weapons and hashish and drugs that active parties are trying to bring into the capital and the south generally and drown the youth in the morass of loss. They have also participated to a great extent in: arresting gangs that deal in the blood of the people and the highway robbery gangs, reinforcing the police divisions in all assignments of protecting the installations and international delegations and global aid organizations, securing celebrations and civil occasions, securing the course of exams, participating in the campaign to remove random debris, opening the cut-off routes in coordination with the local administration for the directorates. The Forces have received facts from the directors of the directorates.
Q: What are the obstacles that the Security Belt Forces faces in restraining criminal activity and eliminating it definitively?
A: There are a group of obstacles that the Security Belt Forces faces and are considered a great help for the delinquents in committing crimes and we have asked the government to deal with them multiple times but to no avail. The obstacles are:
The need for the removal of dunes from the main routes that cause many accidents and constitute an easy trap for the highway robbery gangs because they bog down victims' cars.
The need for re-lighting the general routes and in particular the outback areas that may be exploited by the weak-minded for highway robbery and that is because when a crime happens it is difficult for the victim to define the characteristics of the delinquents or cars of the delinquents because of the darkness in the streets. This means there is delay in apprehending the criminals.
The need to deal seriously with the purveyors of hashish and drugs and establish rehabilitation centres for drug addicts as they are considered a great catastrophe for humanity.
The need to establish centres to arrest and deport African migrants who enter in large groups through coastal smuggling routes that may be exploited by the terrorist groups and Houthi militias in recruiting them and sending them to the fronts.