Documentary Studies in Arabian Geopolitics: South-West Arabia 6 Hardback Volume Set

Library Editions reprints make available CAE originals in a new format. This collection of historical documents provides an examination of the border between Saudi Arabia and Yemen, as at 1995. Such an historical review highlights many of the tensions that have contributed to the more recent degradation of the relationship between the two states.

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In Autumn 1995 the Saudi-Yemeni border constituted Arabia´s last indeterminate territorial limit, with the exception of its westernmost stretches, from the Red Sea to Najran, settled by a treaty of 1934. Talks between the Riyadh and Sana´a Governments on the unresolved border question had been intermittently in progress since July 1992. In February 1995 the two states signed a memorandum of understanding reaffirming the provision of the 1934 Treaty of Taif. The Treaty was formally renewed in June 1995, providing for a re-demarcation of the westernmost boundary and establishing a procedural framework for the settlement of the remainder of the boundary further east. The documents provide a wide historical context in which to view the efforts to finalise the political map of the south-western peninsula. Any settlement finally reached between Saudi Arabia and Yemen will need to take full account of critical factors which have shaped the history of their borderlands.