Yemeni separatists refuse to withdraw after Saudi strikes: spokesman to AFP

Separatists in Yemen on Tuesday vowed to hold and reinforce their territory, dismissing calls from the Saudi-led coalition to withdraw, hours after strikes targeted an alleged weapons shipment in a port under their control.

"There is no thinking about withdrawal. It is unreasonable for the landowner to be asked to leave his own land. The situation requires staying and reinforcing," Anwar Al-Tamimi, the spokesman for the separatist Southern Transitional Council (STC), told AFP.

"We are in a defensive position, and any movement toward our forces will be responded to by our forces," he added.

The spokesman said that Saudi Arabia had moved around 20,000 security forces along its border adjacent to positions held by the STC.

In recent weeks, UAE-backed separatists seeking to revive the formerly independent state of South Yemen have made sweeping territorial gains in a lightning offensive.

Experts say their successes have embarrassed Saudi Arabia, a regional heavyweight and the main backer of the internationally recognised Yemeni government.

On Tuesday, Saudi Arabia declared the STC advance in Yemen a threat to the kingdom's security after launching air strikes targeting an alleged weapons shipment to a port under the STC's control.

The STC spokesman denied that the combat equipment targeted in the strike belonged to them.

"The vehicles belonged to the Emirati forces in Yemen as part of the Arab Coalition and the counterterrorism alliance," Tamimi told AFP.