May 4, 2017

Thousands of south Yemenis demonstrated on Thursday in support of a governor sacked by the president in a blow to his authority and his efforts to keep together a motley loyalist coalition.

In his war with Shiite Muslim rebels who control the capital Sanaa and much of the north, President Abedrabbo Mansour Hadi has relied heavily on militia recruited in the formerly independent south, where separatist sentiment runs deep.

That has often forced him into a difficult balancing act with his other supporters -- Sunni Islamists and loyalist army units from the north.

Thursday's demonstrators converged on the region's main city Aden, where Hadi's government is based, from towns across the south.

Organisers called for sacked Aden governor Aidarous al-Zoubeidi to set up a "national leadership to represent the south" and pledged their allegiance to it, in a statement received by AFP.