Yemen country profile – BBC News

Some key dates in Yemen’s history:

1500s – Ottomans absorb part of Yemen into their empire but are expelled in the 1600s.

1839 – Aden in South Yemen comes under British rule. When the Suez Canal opens in 1869, it serves as a refuelling port of strategic importance to the British empire.

1918 – Ottoman Empire dissolves, North Yemen gains independence and is ruled by Imam Yahya.

1948 – Yahya assassinated, but his son Ahmad fights off opponents of feudal rule and succeeds his father.

1962 – Imam Ahmad dies and is succeeded by his son, but army officers seize power and set up the Yemen Arab Republic, sparking civil war between royalists supported by Saudi Arabia and republicans backed by Egypt.

1967 – Britain withdraws from the south after years of a pro-independence insurgency, and its former territories unite as the People’s Republic of Yemen.

1969 – A communist coup renames the south the People’s Democratic Republic of Yemen and reorients it towards the Soviet bloc.

1990 – The two Yemens unite as the Republic of Yemen with Ali Abdallah Saleh as president, as the Soviet bloc implodes. Tension between former states endures.

1994 – Brief war of secession ends in defeat of southern separatist forces.

2000 – Al-Qaeda gains prominence in Yemen, ushering in a period of terrorist attacks.

2004 – Troops battle Shia insurgency led by Hussein al-Houthi in the north.

2009 – Yemeni army launches a fresh offensive against Houthi rebels in the northern Saada province. Tens of thousands of people are displaced by the fighting.

2010 – Thousands flee government offensive against separatists in southern Shabwa province.

2011 – Arab Spring protests spread to Yemen; President Saleh agrees to hand over power to his deputy, Abdrabbuh Mansour Hadi.

2014 – Houthi Shia rebels overrun the capital, Sanaa, plunging country into a prolonged civil war.

2015 – Saudi Arabia leads international military coalition against the Houthis, who it says are being aided by Iran.

Islamic State carries out its first major attacks in Yemen – two suicide bombings targeting Shia mosques in Sanaa, in which 137 people are killed.

2018 – Southern Yemeni separatists, the Southern Transitional Council – backed by the United Arab Emirates – seize control of Aden, the main city in the south.

2019 – Separatists and government sign power-sharing agreement to end conflict in southern Yemen.

2022 – President Hadi resigns after losing the support of the Saudi-led coalition and the Presidential Leadership Council takes power.