Here’s a story from Dec. 7, 2018, about ex-inmates who say they were beaten, burned, doused with acid and hung from the ceiling in prisons run by Yemen's Houthi rebels. It’s one of the stories that earned AP a Pulitzer today for international reporting.
A look at the Houthis, the Yemeni rebel movement.
He was held for four months and 22 days in an underground cell. He was blindfolded the entire time, he said, but kept count of the days by following the Muslim calls to prayer. Throughout his confinement, he said, his jailers beat him with iron rods and told him he was going to die.The Houthis began in the 1990s as a Shiite revivalist religious movement.
The Houthis have sought to entrench their rule by cracking down on a wide range of perceived enemies — young activists, religious minorities, socialists and others who might oppose Houthi rule.Internally, a moderate faction of Houthi leaders acknowledged abuses and sought to put an end to them. The leader’s brother, Yahia al-Houthi, set up a committee in 2016 to investigate reports of torture and indefinite detentions, and helped free 13,500 prisoners in its first three months.
Anas al-Sarrari recalls slowly regaining consciousness in a dark corridor in the Sanaa’s Political Security prison. The 26-year-old critic of Houthi brutality held his head between his swollen hands and bruised wrists, as flashes of two months of torture raced through his mind. His jailers unchained him from the ceiling for a couple hours each day, when he was given hard bread and a plate of vegetables and dirty rice crawling with cockroaches. When they gave him yogurt, he was able to see the date written on the container and mark the passage of time.He remembered seeing a torturer with a stun gun staring at his head before dealing a blow with all his might. Al-Sarrari collapsed.
Al-Sarrari showed AP copies of his medical records. He now uses a wheelchair and believes that the purpose of his torture and release was to send a message to others who might want to criticize the Houthis. The Houthis became more and more creative, Baakar said. They once brought plastic bottles and with a lighter melted the plastic over his head, back, and between his thighs.
Malaysia Latest News, Malaysia Headlines
Similar News:You can also read news stories similar to this one that we have collected from other news sources.
Saudi-led coalition's air strikes hit Yemeni capitalThe Saudi-led coalition carried out air strikes in Yemen against two Houthi targ...
Read more »
Vaccines blocked as deadly cholera raged across YemenADEN, Yemen (AP) — In the summer of 2017, a plane chartered by the United Nations idled on the tarmac at an airport in the Horn of Africa as officials waited for final clearance to deliver half a...
Read more »
Vaccines blocked as deadly cholera raged across YemenADEN, Yemen (AP) — In the summer of 2017, a plane chartered by the United Nations idled on the tarmac at an airport in the Horn of Africa as officials waited for final clearance to deliver half a million doses of cholera vaccine to Yemen. Amid the country's ruinous war, the disease was spiraling
Read more »
A Massive Vaccination Campaign Is Saving Lives In Wartorn YemenWhile the U.S. reels from a resurgence of measles, communities in Yemen are mobilizing to immunize and protect their children from potentially fatal infectious diseases.
Read more »
AP journalists win Pulitzer for coverage of Yemen civil warAfter one AP story on Yemen, at least 80 prisoners were released from secret detention sites. After another, the U.N. rushed food and medicine to people who were starving. AP reporting that earned a Pulitzer has made a difference in the Yemen civil war.
Read more »
Yemen leader-in-exile Hadi returns for meeting of divided parliamentYemeni President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi, who lives in Saudi Arabia while rival H...
Read more »
With the ISIS caliphate defeated in Syria, an Islamist militant rivalry takes root in YemenThe Islamic State and al-Qaeda branches in Yemen are in a deadly contest for influence.
Read more »
Classified note confirms French weaponry in Yemen: reportInformation from French military intelligence, published by investigative media outlet Disclose, concludes UAE and Saudi Arabia deployed French weaponry from artillery to ships in their war against the Houthis.
Read more »
AP, Reuters win Pulitzer Prizes for international reportingAP reporter Maggie Michael, photographer Nariman El-Mofty and videographer Maad al-Zikry spent a year uncovering atrocities and suffering in Yemen, earning them a Pulitzer Prize in international reporting.
Read more »