Arrest and torture: Tragic facts of Houthi persecution against Africans in Yemen

Ahmed Adel

The terrorist Houthi militia is working to exert oppression against Africans in Yemen, forcing them to flee to neighboring countries.

In the same context, the Houthi militia deported hundreds of African immigrants on Saturday, April 3, the day after the dispersal of a peaceful sit-in in Sanaa by force of arms, which led to the killing and arrest of many of them.

Yemeni activists circulated a video clip on social media of the arrival of dozens of Ethiopian refugees to the town of Haifan in southern Taiz Governorate on the borders of Lahij and the liberated Aden, after the Houthi militia expelled them from Sanaa by force.

Tragic scene

The video footage shows migrants trying to help each other to walk and elderly women walking on their crutches by force.

According to the Yemeni Al-Mashhad website, Yemeni sources revealed that the Houthi militia deported the migrants from Sanaa days after an open sit-in in front of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees to demand an international investigation into the victims of the horrific fire that occurred last month.

The Houthis also launched a widespread campaign of arrests, and citizens in the city of Dhamar in central Yemen were made to pledge not to return to the areas controlled by the militia in the north of the country.

Sources confirmed the arrival of the first batch of migrants to areas under the control of the internationally recognized Yemeni government in Haifan, and they are now on their way to the temporary capital, Aden.

Among the deportees were women, one of whom left her children at home alone and went out to join her comrades in the sit-in, but she was arrested and deported, according to information from Yemeni human rights sources.

The sources emphasized that the Houthi militia not only expelled hundreds of African refugees, but also proceeded to loot their personal properties.

On Friday, April 2, two migrants were killed after the Houthis used force and live bullets to disperse African migrants at the sit-in, according to Yemeni media.

Media reported that the Houthis had surrounded the sit-in and stormed it, and as a result, two people were killed, while 220 Ethiopian refugees, including 55 women, and 45 Somalis were arrested and taken to an unknown destination.

The Houthis had threatened to disperse the sit-ins in Sanaa more than once, and on Friday, armored vehicles and riot control forces were present.

Houthi crimes

The Houthi militia’s deportation of peacefully settling refugees in Sanaa is considered by lawyers and human rights defenders as a crime comparable to the holocaust it committed in the Immigration and Passports Authority detention center.

The Yemeni government condemned the forced deportation carried out by the Iranian-backed Houthi militia against hundreds of African migrants who had organized a sit-in in front of the UNHCR in the seized capital, Sanaa.

According to Minister of Information, Culture and Tourism Moammar Al-Eryani, the government said that the migrants were demanding an international investigation into the burning of dozens of their comrades by the Houthi militia in a detention prison on March 7.

Eryani noted in a series of posts on Twitter that the terrorist Houthi militia had brutally attacked the participants of the sit-in who were demanding accountability for those involved in the holocaust of African migrants.

This attack resulted in the death of a number of migrants and the injury of others, and they were arrested and forcibly deported en masse in cars and dumped in areas under the control of the legitimate government, according to Eryani.

The Yemeni minister called on the international community and international organizations concerned with human rights and refugee protection, led by the International Organization for Migration, to condemn these practices as crimes against humanity.

The attack also “reflects the extent of the terrorist Houthi militia’s disregard for the rules of international humanitarian law and the laws for the protection of refugees and migrants,” Eryani said.

Preliminary information indicates that the number of African refugees who were expelled by the Houthi militia from Sanaa and deported to the liberated Yemeni regions reaches more than 500 immigrants, of whom 210 are males and 200 children and women, all of whom are Ethiopians, in addition to 45 Somali immigrants and others of different nationalities.

On March 25, the Houthi militia suppressed a peaceful protest of immigrants in front of the UNHCR building, which prompted African communities to impose a sit-in to demand accountability for the perpetrators of the crime in Sanaa.

The horrific fire that occurred on March 7 resulted in the death and injury of 400 Ethiopians. According to the testimonies of survivors and international and local organizations, the Houthis resorted to burying the victims and obliterating evidence in advance of the formation of any committees to investigate their crime.