In 2014 Houthis took control of the capital and occupied many government offices, precipitating the relocation of President Hadi and his government in 2015. The ensuing conflict continued as of year’s end. The UN-led peace process included attempts to re-establish a cessation of hostilities at intervals throughout the year, the most recent in December. These efforts made some progress, although the conflict continues. Throughout the year, the Saudi-led Coalition continued military operations against Houthis, including an active military role by the UAE.
The Yemeni government re-established a presence in Aden and additional areas in the South in 2016. On October 18, Abdulmalik Maeen Saeed replaced Ahmed Bin Dagher as prime minister of Yemen. Part of the cabinet remained in Aden with Saeed, with some cabinet members also present in Marib. President Hadi remained abroad in Saudi Arabia.
Throughout the year, clashes occurred as warring parties lost and regained territory. The military’s loyalty was divided among numerous local actors. Armed clashes expanded to several areas of the country among Houthis, supporters of the Islah Party (Sunni Islamist) and the Rashad Party (Salafi), armed separatists affiliated with the southern separatist movement Hirak tribal forces, progovernment resistance forces, and Saudi-led coalition ground forces, with participation by elements of the ROYG’s armed forces. Terrorist groups, including AQAP, carried out many deadly attacks against government representatives and installations, Houthi combatants, members of Hirak, and other actors accused of behavior violating sharia law.
In June the Coalition began a ground offensive on Hudaydah led by the UAE and Yemeni forces. The Coalition captured the airport in the south of the city and eventually Kilos 16 and 10, effectively restricting movement and travel for individuals and goods to Sana’a.
International observers criticized all parties to the conflict for civilian casualties and damage to infrastructure resulting from shelling and airstrikes.
As a result of the fighting, the humanitarian situation in the country deteriorated significantly, with 8.4 million individuals at potential risk for famine and a reported 80 percent of the country’s population requiring humanitarian assistance by year’s end, according to the United Nations. An estimated 2.3 million citizens remained internally displaced during the year. The United Nations estimated that only 55 percent of health facilities remained functional.
The country experienced a cholera outbreak in 2016 and a second, larger surge in April 2017 that the United Nations reported was the largest outbreak worldwide, with more than one million suspected cases. The World Health Organization reported more than 79,500 suspected cases and 166 associated deaths between July 15 and September 22.
Killings: The United Nations, NGOs, media outlets, and humanitarian and international organizations reported what they characterized as disproportionate and indiscriminate use of force by all parties to the continuing conflict.
Per UNOHCHR, from March 2015 to June, there were at least 16,706 civilian casualties, with 6,475 killed and 10,231 injured in the conflict. According to their data, Coalition air strikes caused most of the documented civilian casualties. UNOHCHR’s Group of Experts reviewed 60 instances where air strikes hit residential areas, killing more than 500 civilians, and 29 incidents where air strikes hit public spaces, killing more than 300 civilians. For example, on August 9, a Coalition airstrike hit a school bus in Sa’ada governorate, killing at least 40 and wounding 79, including a significant proportion of schoolchildren. The Coalition later determined the school bus incident was “unjustified.”
Media and NGOs also reported civilian casualties also resulted resulting from indiscriminate shelling by Houthis and their affiliated popular committees. In an August 17 report, the UN Group of Eminent Experts cited instances of women and children hit by shelling and sniper fire by Houthi forces around Taiz while in their homes or outside acquiring water or food. On August 8, fragments from a missile fired into Saudi Arabia by Houthi forces killed one civilian and injured 11, according to Saudi media reports.
Following a visit to Aden early in the year, HRW reported in an April statement that Houthi forces used land mines in six governorates, including in residential areas, which appear to have killed and maimed hundreds of civilians since the conflict began. According to the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project, mines laid by Houthi forces killed 222 civilians since 2016. A March report by Conflict Armament Research found that roadside bombs in Yemen were similar to bombs used by Hezbollah and Iran-linked insurgents in Iraq and Bahrain. In August Coalition demining teams reported decommissioning more than 300,000 mines explosive remnants of war (ERW) over the past two years. Additionally, internationally funded ERW clearance operations carried out by the United Nations Development Programme cleared 5.1 million square meters and more than 136,000 explosive hazards in 2017.
Other deaths resulted from attacks and killings by armed groups, including AQAP and ISIS.
The Guardian newspaper reported that fighting between both sides within the densely populated city of Hudaydah killed at least 150 individuals in the second two weeks of November and led more than 445,000 to flee since the summer.
The UNOHCHR recorded at least 32 instances where Coalition missiles struck humanitarian sites, despite their designation on a no-strike list. On June 11, Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) reported that an air strike hit a new cholera treatment center in the Abs district of Hajjah Governorate. MSF indicated that the facility’s coordinates were shared with the Coalition on 12 separate occasions.
The Coalition has conducted investigations of civilian casualties, acknowledged mistakes, and committed to reviewing targeting procedures. The Coalition’s Joint Incident Assessment Team (JIAT), based in Riyadh and consisting of 14 military and civilian members from coalition member states, investigated some incidents of airstrikes that reportedly resulted in civilian casualties. The UNOHCHR and others asserted the Coalition’s JIAT investigations did not provide sufficient transparency on the targeting process for strikes and HRW stated that the JIAT’s public conclusions raised serious questions regarding the ways in which the JIAT conducted investigations and applied international humanitarian law.
Abductions: The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) documented the abduction of seven Akhbar al-Youm staff on March 1, whom Security Belt forces held for a month. Fathi bin Lazraq, editor-in-chief of the newspaper Aden al-Ghad, told CPJ the Emergency Battalion in Aden detained him for eight hours on July 1. Lazraq said that the Emergency Battalion operated under the umbrella of the Security Belt forces. Lazraq was eventually released the same day by order of the commander of anti-terror forces.
HRW reported that the Houthi-controlled Political Security Office kidnapped individuals for ransom, sometimes letting months pass before informing relatives they were detained. A woman interviewed by HRW claimed she had paid 1.5 million Yemeni riyals ($6,000) to Houthi officials over the last three years to free her husband, who remained in Houthi custody. The UN Panel of Experts on Yemen found that Political Security Office members were “profiting from detentions.”
Physical Abuse, Punishment, and Torture: An August HRW report alleged more than 49 persons died as a result of torture administered by Yemeni guards in UAE-operated clandestine detention centers. AI investigated the cases of 51 men detained by Security Belt and Elite Forces between March 2016 and May 2018 in Aden, Lahj, Abyan, Hadramawt, and Shabwa governorates. Current and former detainees and families gave Amnesty accounts of abuse including beatings, use of electric shocks, and sexual violence. One detainee told Amnesty he saw a fellow detainee carried away in a body bag after being repeatedly tortured. Another former detainee said UAE soldiers at a coalition base in Aden repeatedly inserted an object into his anus until he bled. He said he was also kept in a hole in the ground with only his head above the surface and left to defecate and urinate on himself in that position.
HRW reported Houthi forces frequently detained hostages for extortion and profiteering. While detained by the Houthis, detainees described being beaten, whipped, shackled to walls, caned, and threatened with rape or rape of their family members by Houthi officers. Detainees were refused medical assistance or treatment after their abuse and many released suffered from physical and psychological health complications.
Following a visit to Aden early in the year, HRW reported in an April statement that Houthi forces used land mines in six governorates, including in residential areas, which appear to have killed and maimed hundreds of civilians since the conflict began. In August Coalition demining teams reported decommissioning more than 300,000 mines explosive remnants of war (ERW) over the past two years. Additionally, internationally funded ERW clearance operations carried out by the United Nations Development Programme cleared 5.1 million square meters and more than 136,000 explosive hazards in 2017.
Child Soldiers: Although Yemeni law and ROYG policy expressly forbid the practice, children younger than age of 18 participated in armed conflict for government, tribal, Houthi, and militant forces. The ROYG military strongly denied it recruited child soldiers. Nearly one-third of the combatants in the country were younger than 18, by some estimates. The lack of a consistent system for birth registration compounded difficulties in proving age, which at times contributed to the recruitment of minors into the military.
The UNOHCR Secretary-General reported 842 verified cases of recruitment and use of boys as young as 11 years old in 2017. Nearly two thirds of these cases were attributed to the Houthi Forces, with a substantial increase in the number attributed to the Security Belt Forces and the Yemen Armed Forces as compared with 2016. The United Nations also documented the deprivation of liberty of boys by armed forces and groups for their alleged association with opposing parties.
Tribes, primarily affiliated with the Houthis and including some armed and financed by the government to fight alongside the regular army, used underage recruits in combat zones, according to reports by international NGOs, such as Save the Children. The UNOHCHR investigation found information indicating government, Coalition-backed forces, and Houthi forces all conscripted or enlisted children into armed forces or groups and used them to participate actively in hostilities. These reports were strongly denied by the ROYG. Houthis also routinely used children to staff checkpoints, act as human shields, or serve as suicide bombers. Combatants reportedly involved married boys between the ages of 12 and 15 in fighting in the northern tribal areas; tribal custom considered married boys as adults who owe allegiance to the tribe. As a result, according to international and local human rights NGOs, one-half of tribal fighters were youths younger than age 18. Other observers noted that tribes rarely placed boys in harm’s way but used them as guards rather than fighters.
During the year the Houthis and other armed groups, including tribal and Islamist militias and AQAP, increased their recruitment, training, and deployment of children as participants in the conflict. According to a February AI report, Houthi representatives ran local centers where young boys and men were encouraged to fight. One source said the Houthis imposed recruitment quotas on local representatives. UNOHCHR reported Houthi forces also forcibly recruited children in schools, hospitals, and door-to-door or used appeals to patriotism and financial incentives.
Also see the Department of State’s annual Trafficking in Persons Report at www.state.gov/j/tip/rls/tiprpt/.
Other Conflict-related Abuse: All parties to the conflict routinely imposed severe restrictions on movements of people, goods, and humanitarian assistance. Food insecurity, fuel shortages, damage to local infrastructure, and lack of access for humanitarian organizations to vulnerable populations contributed to the deteriorating humanitarian situation.
The government, the Coalition, or both delayed or denied clearance permits for some humanitarian and commercial aid shipments bound for rebel-held Red Sea ports and government-controlled ports. The Coalition continued to place restrictions on certain cargoes and its secondary clearance process led to uncertainty and delays experienced by vessels approved by the UN Verification and Inspection Mechanism for Yemen.
The Houthi militias’ forceful takeover and misadministration of government institutions led to dire economic consequences--nonpayment of workers’ wages and allegations of widespread corruption, including at checkpoints controlled by Houthi militias--that severely affected the timely and efficient distribution of food aid and exacerbated food insecurity.
Militias held trucks containing food, medical supplies, and aid equipment at checkpoints and prevented or delayed them from entering major cities.
There were reports of attacks on health-care facilities and health-care workers. Physicians for Human Rights confirmed 12 armed attacks against healthcare facilities and personnel, including two attacks on ambulances. On February 24, Al-Thawra Hospital in Taizz closed in protest after masked gunmen kidnapped a doctor at its front gate. On May 6, dozens of armed fighters invaded the hospital’s emergency and operating rooms, threatening doctors and shooting a patient. Physicians for Human Rights reported several instances of mortar shells hitting hospitals in Taizz and al-Hudaydah in March, April, and May.
There were reports of the use of civilians to shield combatants. Houthi forces reportedly used captives as human shields at military encampments and ammunition depots under threat of coalition airstrikes.