Nisma Mansoor, a 24-year-old engineering student and activist from Aden, remembers a time when there were no concrete walls, and children could run freely in the quiet streets. “This ‘hide your women’ thing happened only after unification,” she said. “Now you can barely see a woman that is not covering her face. Everyone is more conservative, asking, ‘Why are you going out? Why are you working? Why do you have male friends?’ Even the girls themselves have started to adopt this mentality.” Mansoor is working with the Peace Track Initiative, an organization of women’s activists, to petition the international community to include women in peace talks between the Houthis and Yemen’s internationally recognized government when they eventually take place. (On Monday, Yemen’s government agreed to participate in United Nations-sponsored peace negotiations in Sweden after the Houthis agreed to halt rocket and missile attacks against Saudi Arabia and its allies.) She believes that Yemen will never achieve stability or security if women are not included. As an engineer, Mansoor also wants the reconstruction of Yemen to include gender-sensitive projects, like building wells closer to remote villages so women do not have to walk as far and risk their safety to collect water and complete their daily tasks.

The Southern Transitional Council, a United Arab Emirates-backed organization of provincial leaders advocating the south’s secession, had scheduled a rally for Oct. 14 to commemorate the start of a revolt in 1963 against British colonial rule in South Yemen. The council canceled it last minute, saying they wanted to put the funds toward humanitarian projects instead. The growing secessionist movement fueled factional clashes among the Saudi-backed coalition earlier this year and has complicated the prospects of a peaceful resolution in Yemen. While the international committee has acknowledged the council’s demands, they are not a part of the upcoming peace talks in Sweden, according to United Nations officials.

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Despite the event’s being called off, hundreds turned out in the square. The atmosphere was celebratory but tense. Marching bands wove through crowds of men chewing mouthfuls of qat, a plant that induces a mild high. Pickup trucks with machine guns mounted on the back slowly drove down the street as young, armed men jumped on and off with excitement. On the main stage, political leaders, both men and women, were giving impassioned speeches to a steadily growing crowd. The women’s section made up half the stage. Female activists, wearing niqabs and abayas, draped their black-clad bodies with banners boldly displaying the flag of the southern separatist movement. They carried pink purses with messages of female empowerment written on the front, passionately chanting at the crowd. “They could have us burned alive or burn our children right before our eyes,” one activist said the day before. “We are willing to die here. We’re demanding some human rights here.”

After about 30 minutes, a scuffle broke out between two people in the crowd, causing people gathered below the stage to panic. Hundreds of people dispersed within seconds, leaving the square almost empty. The activists moved to a quiet street behind the stage, all while shaking their heads and chuckling. One of them had her young son with her. He, too, was smiling. “Don’t worry, everything is O.K.,” the mother told me. “You’re safe.”