By: HISTORY.com Editors

1990

South Yemen and North Yemen are unified as the Republic of Yemen

Published: February 09, 2010Last Updated: May 27, 2025

After 150 years apart, Marxist South Yemen and conservative North Yemen are unified as the Republic of Yemen. Ali Abdullah, president of North Yemen, became the new country’s president, and Ali Salem Al-Baidh, leader of the South Yemeni Socialist Party, vice president. The first free elections were held in 1993.

Situated at the southern tip of the Arabian Peninsula, Yemen was divided between the British and the Ottomans in the mid-19th century. The Turks were expelled from the north in 1918, but the British continued to dominate the south until 1967, when the Arab world’s first and only Marxist state, the People’s Republic of South Yemen, was established.

The unification of Yemen in 1990 did not go as smoothly as hoped; economic troubles in 1991 brought Yemen to the brink of collapse, and a civil war in 1994 between southern secessionists and Yemen’s northern-based government temporarily dissolved the Yemeni union. Free elections resumed in 1997.

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Citation Information

Article Title: South Yemen and North Yemen are unified as the Republic of Yemen
Author: HISTORY.com Editors
Website Name: History
URL: https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/may-22/yemen-united

Date Accessed: October 21, 2026
Publisher: A&E Television Networks
Last Updated: May 27, 2025
Original Published Date: February 09, 2010

South Yemen and North Yemen are unified as the Republic of Yemen

Related

Middle Eastern History

Persian or Iranian? Here’s How They Differ

The Strait of Hormuz: A Timeline of Tensions

What Led to the 1979 Iranian Revolution?

About the author

Fact Check

Citation Information