Yemen, South

Yemen, South Its commercial and strategic nucleus, Aden, was occupied by the British in 1839, to help secure the passage to India. It was ruled from India by the presidency of Bombay, until it was governed directly by the government of the British colony of India in 1932. Aden itself became a Crown Colony in 1937, with its surrounding territory becoming a British protectorate. The latter became the South Arabian Federation of Arab Emirates in 1959, which the colony of Aden joined in 1963. Influenced by the republican and Arabic nationalist movements in neighbouring North Yemen, a National Liberation Front emerged in a civil war and was victorious against the rival FLOSY (Front for the Liberation of Occupied South Yemen).

The civil war resulted in independence in 1967, as the Democratic People's Republic of Yemen. Attempts were made to impose Communism upon an Arab society, through nationalization, collectivization and the creation of co-operatives, and central planning. All this was established with generous help from the USSR, which in return gained Aden as an important naval base. Relatively egalitarian income distribution and a reduction in illiteracy failed to gain widespread acceptance of the regime. After a brief civil war in 1986, unity talks with North Yemen succeeded in the late 1980s, whereupon a united Republic of Yemen was created.