North Yemen Foreign Relations South Yemen

Conservative Yemen and Marxist South Yemen have united their armed forces and agreed to withdraw them from their capitals in the latest swift move towards a historic merger scheduled for this month. Officials and diplomats have widely predicted that a united Yemen will be declared before the end of May. The Sana-based weekly publication 26 September quoted "reliable sources" Sunday as saying the declaration will come during the last week of May, six months ahead of schedule.

Two countries on the Arabian Peninsula, Yemen and South Yemen, joined Tuesday to become one nation, the Republic of Yemen, an impoverished land sitting on newly discovered oil reserves. Gen. Ali Abdullah Saleh, the president of the unified state, raised the new country's red, white and black flag at noon atop the Presidential Council building at port side. The republic is poor but has recently located oil reserves unofficially put at 2 billion barrels.

With the hoisting of a common red-white-and-black flag over two former capitals this week, the reunification of the Republic of Yemen closed the book on Marxism in the Middle East and signaled the emergence of a potentially important new political power on the Arabian peninsula. Separately, Western-oriented Yemen and its Marxist neighbor, South Yemen, were two of the poorest nations in the world, deeply divided by politics, religion and historic tribal disputes.

Leaders of pro-Western Yemen and Marxist South Yemen signed a draft constitution as a first step toward the unification of the two countries on the tip of the Arabian Peninsula. After 18 years of intermittent talks, the two countries published a draft constitution and said it will be referred to their legislative bodies for endorsement. The two Yemens will merge into a republic of about 11 million people.