Due to the protracted conflict and unstable political situation, the government faced serious challenges in combating trafficking, including substantial internal security threats, weak institutions, systemic corruption, economic deprivation, food insecurity, social disintegration, limited territorial control, and poor law enforcement capabilities. The absence of a law criminalizing all forms of trafficking and the government’s conflation of human trafficking with migrant smuggling further hindered government efforts to investigate and prosecute trafficking offenders. Article 248 of the penal code criminalized slavery and prescribed penalties of up to 10 years’ imprisonment; these penalties were sufficiently stringent and, with respect to sex trafficking, commensurate with penalties prescribed for other grave crimes, such as rape. However, inconsistent with the definition of trafficking in persons under international law, article 248 narrowly focused on transactions and movement and therefore did not criminalize many forms of labor and sex trafficking. Article 279 criminalized child sex trafficking under its prostitution provision and prescribed penalties of up to seven years’ imprisonment, which could be increased to up to 15 years’ imprisonment under aggravating circumstances; these penalties were sufficiently stringent and commensurate with those prescribed for other grave crimes, such as rape.

Although the ROYG had some oversight over its court system, experts noted judicial institutions largely did not function due to infrastructure damage, severe staff shortages, financial and security challenges, weak law enforcement capacity, and the fragmented nature of authority in Yemen. The government did not report anti-trafficking law enforcement efforts. Officials continued to conflate human trafficking, migrant smuggling, and other crimes, limiting the ROYG’s ability to hold traffickers accountable. For example, in August 2024, media reported ROYG law enforcement authorities in Shabwah identified a “trafficking ring” and arrested four Ethiopians who allegedly held 30 Ethiopian migrants hostage and demanded ransom of up to 3,000 Saudi Riyals ($800) for their release; the victims also were reportedly tortured during their captivity. ROYG authorities did not report if the migrants were provided assistance or updates on the investigation of the alleged traffickers, including whether any alleged trafficking crimes were identified as part of the arrests. The government did not report any investigations, prosecutions, or convictions of government officials complicit in trafficking crimes; however, corruption and official complicity in trafficking crimes remained significant concerns, including the alleged recruitment and use of child soldiers by the government and government-affiliated forces, inhibiting law enforcement action. There were some reports the government and government-affiliated forces recruited and used a limited number of child soldiers, including children who took a direct part in hostilities and children younger than 15 years old, in combat and support roles. The government reported it received anti-trafficking training from NGOs and an international organization during the reporting period, but it did not provide support to these trainings or report additional details on training topics.

ROYG authorities and institutions responsible for monitoring migrant flows, providing services and protection to migrants, and assisting vulnerable groups, including trafficking victims, functioned minimally. The government had limited capacity to identify and provide adequate protection services to trafficking victims among vulnerable groups, such as women in commercial sex and migrant workers, some of whom were in transit to Gulf states; the government generally relied on NGOs and international organizations to identify and provide assistance to potential trafficking victims. One NGO noted a significant gap in protection because of a lack of service providers in the country; an international organization reported limited services were available for some vulnerable populations, but dedicated trafficking shelters did not exist.

Due to inadequate screening among vulnerable populations, including women in commercial sex, migrant workers, and migrants traveling to the Gulf through Yemen, the government did not take effective measures to prevent the inappropriate penalization of potential victims solely for unlawful acts committed as a direct result of being trafficked. One international organization reported challenges in identification of potential foreign trafficking victims because of a lack of awareness of the crime by officials, insufficient identification and referral training, lack of systemic and safe referral pathways for potential victims to care, and general lack of interest from officials to address crimes, including human trafficking, committed against non-Yemenis. Observers noted significant barriers to care for vulnerable migrants, versus Yemeni citizens, especially in ROYG-controlled areas. International organizations also reported instances of ROYG authorities arresting and deporting vulnerable migrants without screening for trafficking indicators during the reporting period. The government was not able to encourage victims to assist in investigations or prosecutions of traffickers and was financially unable to provide assistance to its nationals repatriated after enduring trafficking abroad.

The government did not make sufficient efforts to prevent trafficking. The government maintained the National Committee to Combat Human Trafficking, comprising government and non-government representatives; however, the committee did not meet during the reporting period. The government remained without a national action plan or strategy to combat trafficking. A January 2025 order by the ROYG’s Under Secretary of Immigration, Passports, and National Authority required all private sector companies to “prevent” employment of foreign nationals from their workforce, which would drive these individuals into unregulated markets where trafficking risks were higher. The government did not provide anti-trafficking training to its diplomatic personnel or make efforts to reduce the demand for commercial sex acts.

There was a notable increase in the recruitment, training, and mobilization of children in the conflict by the Houthis, particularly after the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas conflict, while recruitment and use by government and government-affiliated armed forces continued on a limited basis. The ROYG continued to make efforts toward a 2014 UN action plan to end the recruitment and use of child soldiers and the subsequent 2018 roadmap agreement with the UN to implement the plan, including by maintaining child protection units in all military regions and conducting field visits to disseminate directives banning child recruitment and to verify the absence of children in military ranks. The Ministry of Legal Affairs conducted a training for military contact points in Aden, including 80 liaison officers that represented relevant military units, focused on identification of child soldiers in military ranks and monitoring and preventing child soldier recruitment and use in their own units. The Joint Technical Committee and an international organization conducted a two-day workshop in January 2025 to review accomplishments within the 2014 action plan and 2018 roadmap and establish future priorities to prevent and end child soldier recruitment and use in Yemen.

An international organization reported the Houthis increasingly subjected children to military propaganda and training, including through the use of “summer camps” and through weekly classes and sermons on jihad delivered in schools to indoctrinate and recruit children. In April 2024, Houthi authorities in Amran issued a directive to all education departments to mandate the rapid establishment of additional summer camps; by June 2024, an international organization reported Amran had 696 “open” summer camps and five “closed” summer camps, with 15,000 students enrolled. Closed summer camps reportedly isolated children from their families for two weeks, where they were trained in combat skills. Between January and July 2024, an international organization reported the Houthis recruited and used 3,298 children as human shields, as spies, for planting landmines and other explosive devices, and as cooks in combat. Some cases of the unlawful recruitment and use of child soldiers by the Houthis and government and government-affiliated forces occurred with familial knowledge or consent, while other cases occurred through abduction, coercion, or threats of retribution if families refused to comply with recruitment, specifically by the Houthis. One NGO reported children were mostly offered financial incentives for recruitment from government and government-affiliated forces; in other cases, feelings of animosity and resentment toward the Houthis – particularly among the IDP population – as well as familial political affiliations motivated children to join the armed forces. In 2024, an international organization reported an increase in recruitment of girls by the Zaynabiyat – a Houthi all-female security wing – through abduction and threats; abducted children were also reportedly exploited in domestic servitude or sexual violence. In other cases, monetary and material support – including offers of salaries and food baskets for families, as well as waiving registration fees for the next school year – were reportedly used as incentives for joining the Houthis. In cases where families refused to send their children to join Houthi forces, officials reportedly removed the child’s family from beneficiary lists for humanitarian assistance and/or abducted and detained children and subjected them to various forms of abuse, including sexual violence. Government and government-affiliated forces and other armed groups, including the Houthis, used boys mostly in combatant roles, to guard checkpoints, lay land mines, and to drive military vehicles, and forced other children to carry out support duties such as delivering supplies and escorting. In 2024, Yemeni officials did not report demobilizing any child soldiers. Government and government-affiliated forces and Houthi forces detained children for alleged association with armed groups.

Trafficking affects all communities. This section summarizes government and civil society reporting on the nature and scope of trafficking over the past five years. Human traffickers exploit domestic and foreign victims in Yemen, and traffickers exploit victims from Yemen abroad. The ongoing conflict, limited rule of law, economic degradation, pervasive corruption, and fractional territorial control have disrupted some trafficking patterns and exacerbated others. Many Ethiopians and Somalis travel voluntarily to Yemen with the hope of employment in Gulf countries, particularly Saudi Arabia, and more recently, Oman; traffickers exploit most of these migrants in forced labor and sex trafficking in transit countries, reportedly most often in Yemen. An international organization reported 60,897 migrants arrived in Yemen in 2024. Migrants are subjected to sex trafficking, forced labor, physical and sexual abuse, forced marriage, abduction for ransom, and targeted shootings, including killings, by Saudi security forces at the Yemen-Saudi Arabia border. NGOs continue to report traffickers or smugglers often exploit female migrants in sex trafficking involving wealthy Yemeni men as clients. Traffickers and smugglers also exploit women and men unable to pay smugglers to continue their journey in forced labor as domestic workers, in construction sites, or directly for smugglers – cooking, cleaning, and serving khat at gatherings. In these instances, the smugglers collect the migrant’s wages, subjecting them to debt bondage. NGOs continue to report some migrants are subjected to forced criminality, including transporting weapons and drugs inside Yemen and across the border into Saudi Arabia. In some cases, to escape situations of forced labor or forced criminality, migrant women marry smugglers or traffickers to enter Saudi Arabia and find employment as domestic workers; in many of these arrangements, the women’s “husbands” mislead Saudi employers to receive the women’s salary directly, exploiting the worker in forced labor. Many migrants are forcibly transferred between different smugglers’ camps in Yemen in remote areas of Al Bayda, Ma’rib, Shabwah, and Mahrah governates, where they have no freedom of movement and are subjected to forced labor on khat plantations, as domestic workers, and at ports. Reports of forcible transfer from northern to southern Yemen continue, and reports indicate neighboring local or national governments increasingly push back migrants, including potential trafficking victims, across governate, district, and international borders, including by security forces at the Oman-Yemen and Saudi Arabia-Yemen borders. Media reports allege the Houthis forcibly recruit African migrants – particularly Ethiopians – to join their ranks and transfer hundreds to training facilities; the Houthis also subject migrants to forced criminality, including drug trafficking.

Yemeni workers in Saudi Arabia forced to return to Yemen because they could not find employment or after deportation by Saudi authorities face violence and increased vulnerability to trafficking upon their return. In 2024, an international organization reported 49,523 Yemenis left Saudi Arabia, the majority of whom were deported without travel documents. Conditions in Yemen and violence at the Saudi Arabia-Yemen border by Saudi security forces led to a substantial flow of returnees among migrants who originated in the Horn of Africa, particularly Ethiopia. Perilous migration conditions and lack of humanitarian and protection assistance, caused some migrants to return home using smugglers, increasing their vulnerability to trafficking, including forced labor. In December 2024, approximately 1,784 migrants returned to the Horn of Africa from Yemen via smuggling boats.

Human rights organizations report all parties to the conflict continue unlawful recruitment and use of child soldiers. Documentation of such cases remains challenging because of security threats against the monitors, detainment of aid staff, and ongoing violence against communities of interest and continued access restrictions. An international organization reported the conflict had pushed two million children out of school and forced many to seek work to provide for their families, increasing their vulnerability to exploitation, including child labor, particularly in the agricultural sector.