Dubai: Human Rights Watch accused Yemeni rebels on Thursday of arbitrarily detaining, torturing and forcibly disappearing opponents since they overran the capital in September 2014.
The group said it had documented two deaths in custody and 11 cases of alleged torture, one of of a child.
It said they were among hundreds of reported cases of arbitrary detention by Iran-backed Al Houthi rebels and their allies - renegade troops loyal to ousted Yemeni president Ali Abdullah Saleh.
The rebels are battling government forces who are backed by a Saudi-led Arab coalition, which intervened in March 2015 when President Abd Rabbo Mansour Hadi fled into exile.
“The authorities (in Sanaa) should free those wrongfully held immediately, end detention without access to lawyers or family members, and prosecute officials responsible for mistreatment,” HRW said.
“The conflict with the Saudi Arabia-led coalition provides no justification for torture and ‘disappearance’ of perceived opponents,” it added.
In August and September 2016, Human Rights Watch interviewed five former detainees and 19 relatives and friends of those detained in Sanaa and elsewhere in Yemen.
Since August 2014, Human Rights Watch has documented Al Houthis’ arbitrary or abusive detention of at least 61 people. The authorities have since released at least 26, but 24 remain in custody and two died during detention. Families have not been able to learn the whereabouts of nine more men, who have seemingly been forcibly disappeared.
Many people appear to have been arrested because of their links to Islah, a Sunni opposition party, but students, journalists, activists, and members of the Baha’i community have also been arrested and detained for apparently politically motivated reasons.
On September 20, Al Houthis declared a general amnesty for anyone, civilian or military, who had assisted the Saudi-led coalition and had returned home within two months, given up arms, and signed a pledge disavowing any further support to the coalition.
On November 12, a local nongovernmental organisation told Human Rights Watch that no steps had been taken to implement the decision and that the authorities were continuing to arrest and detain people without charge.
