Yemeni demands for international action to force the Houthis to release the kidnapped women – Details
Houthi terrorism has not only destabilized Yemen’s security and stability, but its practices against women and children constitute the largest human rights violation in the region. The Yemeni government is calling for real international action to force the Houthi militias, Iran’s arm in Yemen, to release those who have been abducted and forcibly disappeared from their prisons.
Information Minister Muammar al-Eryani announced in a statement published by Saba, Yemen’s official news agency. The statement addressed the issue of women kidnapped in Houthi militia prisons and the latter’s systematic violations that Yemeni women have been subjected to since the beginning of the coup.
“Since their coup against the state, the Houthi terrorist militia affiliated with Iran has kidnapped hundreds of Yemeni women from their homes, workplaces, public streets, checkpoints and taken them to secret prisons,” al-Eryani said. “They have been accused of extortion, psychological and physical torture, harassment and sexual assault as a result of their political, media and human rights activism, which is alien to Yemen and Yemenis.”
According to statistics documented by specialized human rights organizations, around 1,700 women have been kidnapped in Houthi militia detention since the coup, including human rights activists, journalists, and activists. Hundreds of them remain behind bars, and hundreds have been released after they pressured their families and made pledges that they would not participate in anti-militia protests or write on media and social media platforms.
The Minister called on the international community, the United Nations and its Special Envoy for Yemen to take real and effective action to force the Houthi terrorist militia to release all abductees and forcibly disappeared in their illegal detention centers, where conditions of detention, degrading and harsh treatment, and denial of health care and necessities are tragic.
He called on human rights organizations and bodies and the defense of women’s issues and the fight against violence against women to stand in solidarity with the abducted and forcibly disappeared and to work to pursue the leaders and members of the Houthi militias involved in the repressive practices, crimes and systematic violations that Yemeni women have been subjected to since 2014, as war crimes and crimes against humanity, in flagrant violation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination against Women.
Yemeni women and their children are subjected to the most horrific abuses documented in areas controlled by Houthi militias, despite warnings from Yemeni organizations.
Women detainees have been raped by militia prison supervisors, girls have committed suicide at the Central Prison in Sana’a, and the Houthis have not allowed medical examinations of female detainees and investigation of causes of death inside detention centers, according to human rights reports.
Women were subjected to all kinds of physical torture, including beating with sticks and electrical cords, being slapped, being stopped by suffocation, being drowned with water, verbal torture such as insults and psychological torture to confess to things they did not do, and fabricating malicious and immoral charges against detainees, such as forming prostitution rings.
