UN Demands Release Of Aid Workers Held By Houthis

The UN rights chief Volker Turk on Tuesday demanded that Yemen's Houthi rebels must immediately and unconditionally" release detained UN staff and other aid workers.

The UN and aid groups said late last week that the Iran-backed rebels had detained more than a dozen aid workers, many of them UN staff, in what appeared to be a coordinated move.

The Houthis, who are engaged in a long-running civil war that has triggered one of the world's worst humanitarian crises, did not specify how many people were arrested.

The rebels seized control of the capital Sanaa in September 2014, prompting a Saudi-led military intervention on behalf of the government the following March.

As for non-UN staff detained, the Yemeni Mayyun Organization for Human Rights said at least 18 Yemeni aid workers were kidnapped in four rebel-held parts of the war-torn country.

The Houthis have kidnapped, arbitrarily detained and tortured hundreds of civilians, including United Nations and NGO workers, since the start of Yemen's conflict in 2014, according to Human Rights Watch.

The latest "detentions come in addition to two other UN Human Rights staff, who were already detained, one of whom has been detained since August 2023, and the other since November 2021," Turk said.

"Both of them have been held incommunicado, without any due process," he lamented, adding that "UNESCO also had two personnel detained prior to the latest detentions".

Turk pointed out that his office had been "working in Yemen since 2012, for the promotion and protection of the rights of all the people of Yemen, including through engagement with the de facto authorities".

"Any further targeting of human rights and humanitarian workers in Yemen must cease immediately," he said.