a city in the People’s Democratic Republic of Yemen. Population in 1964, 225,000. An important transit port on the coast of the Arabian Sea near the strait of Bab el Mandeb. Aden is an oil-refining center, handling approximately 8 million tons a year from the Persian Gulf area. Most of its trade deals with oil and oil products, farm products—grains, tobacco, cotton, and hides and skins—and fish. Textile manufacture, tanning, salt production, and ship repairing are of some importance. There is an international airport.
Aden, one of the ancient South Arabian states, was known to ancient Greek and Roman geographers as Adan or Asan. It was an important transit and trading center. In 1839 it was seized by England and became an English military naval (and later a military air force) base which the English colonizers used to widen their possessions in southwestern Arabia and to spread English influence in the Near and Middle East. The importance of Aden greatly increased after the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869. There were anti-British people’s demonstrations in Aden in 1947, 1954, and 1956–61. In 1963, Aden was included in the Federation of Southern Arabia. The English Army was forced out of Aden by the victory of the national liberation revolution on Nov. 30, 1967, and the city became part of the People’s Republic of Southern Yemen.