Short-lived confederation of the United Arab Republic and the Kingdom of Yemen (1958–1961)
This article is about the 1958–1961 confederation between the United Arab Republic and the Kingdom of Yemen. For the 1958–1961 union of Egypt and Syria, see United Arab Republic. For the 1958 confederation between the Kingdom of Iraq and the Kingdom of Jordan, see Arab Federation. For the 1972-1977 union of Libya, Egypt and Syria, see Federation of Arab Republics. For the 1974 union of Tunisia and Libya, see Arab Islamic Republic. For the general concept of a united Arab state, see Arab Union.
The United Arab Republic was a sovereign state formed by the union of Egypt and Syria in 1958. The same year, the Kingdom of Yemen (North Yemen), which had already signed a defense pact with Egypt, joined with the new state on March 8, 1958, in a loose confederation called the United Arab States. One reason for this decision was that, for a long time, Yemen had felt threatened by its considerably larger and more powerful northern neighbour, Saudi Arabia (the two had fought a war in 1934, and still shared a partially undemarcated border), and thus saw the confederation as a source of security.[1] However, unlike the member countries of the United Arab Republic, North Yemen remained an independent sovereign state. It maintained its UN membership and separate embassies throughout the whole period of confederation.
Neither the union nor the confederation fulfilled their role as vehicles of pan-Arabism or Arab nationalism, as they were dissolved in 1961.