Aden (Union)
The Yemeni government said that the Houthi group had brought nothing but destruction and devastation in the 10 years since its coup against the Yemeni state institutions, and that September 21, 2014 was the “ominous day of catastrophe” when the Houthi group invaded the capital, Sana’a, and took control of state institutions by force of arms, leading the country to “the worst setback in its history due to the catastrophic and tragic reality it left behind on all levels.”
This came in a press statement made by the Yemeni Minister of Information, Culture and Tourism, Muammar Al-Eryani, in which he said that the Houthi group has deliberately, since its coup, “produced wars, crises, tragedies, fragmentation and division,” and that it “committed the worst human rights violations, both quantitatively and qualitatively, and targeted the destruction of children’s lives by recruiting them, planted millions of mines, and adopted a systematic policy of impoverishment and starvation to humiliate and subjugate Yemenis, by cutting salaries, imposing taxes and levies, eliminating job and education opportunities, and creating a parallel economy by destroying the national economy and targeting commercial houses.”
Al-Eryani pointed out that the group “robbed the Yemenis of their lives, security, food, present and future, and tore apart their cohesive social fabric, by feeding regional and ethnic tendencies, and by seeking through schools and curricula, sectarianizing education, emptying the educational process in the primary and university stages of its content, destroying the role of science and culture, and developing ignorance in all ways and methods, to erode the national identity.”
Al-Eryani stressed that this anniversary comes after the Yemenis realized the truth about the Houthi group and that it “has no project other than death, destruction and devastation, and the extent of its inability and failure to manage the occupied areas and provide the most basic rights represented in salaries and basic services,” adding that the Yemenis have lived for ten years in the shadow of the quartet (poverty, hunger, ignorance and disease).
Al-Eryani pointed out that what gives hope on the tenth anniversary of the Nakba is the ongoing resistance of Yemenis of all political orientations and societal groups, and the overwhelming popular rejection of the Houthi group’s project in the governorates under its control, as Yemenis realize that the Houthi coup is the root of the problem from which all subsequent problems and crises have arisen, including war, fighting, destruction, devastation, displacement, migration, and exorbitant prices.
In another context, the Yemeni Journalists Syndicate condemned the kidnapping of Yemeni journalist Mohammed Al-Mayahy and demanded his immediate release. The Syndicate said in a press release that it “received a report from colleagues of journalist Mohammed Al-Mayahy stating that he was kidnapped on Friday morning by the Houthi group after raiding his apartment and taking him and his personal devices to an unknown location.”
The Yemeni Journalists Syndicate renewed its rejection of the arrest campaign that targeted a number of media professionals on the basis of their opinions and writings. The Syndicate called on the de facto authorities to “stop this repressive approach and not restrict freedom of opinion and expression.” The Syndicate also called on all organizations concerned with freedom of opinion and expression to stand in solidarity with Al-Mayah and work to release him and all other detainees held by the Houthi group.
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