Yemen is the Middle Eastern country that includes Socotra, the island famous for its dragon blood trees.
Socotra lies in the Arabian Sea, east of the Horn of Africa, and is the largest island in the Socotra archipelago. Its long geographic isolation has produced an unusually distinctive ecosystem, with many plants and animals found nowhere else on Earth.
The dragon blood tree, Dracaena cinnabari, has an umbrella-shaped crown and red resin. The resin was historically valued as a dye, medicine, and varnish, which inspired the tree’s striking common name.
UNESCO designated the Socotra Archipelago a World Heritage Site in 2008 because of its exceptional biodiversity. Socotra is geographically closer to Africa than to Yemen’s mainland, but it is politically part of Yemen and is administered as part of that country.