More than 2,000 Yemeni children have been killed on the battlefield
The Asian country has been immersed in a civil war since 2014, led by the Houthi insurgents, who took control of Yemen's capital, Sana'a, as well as most of the north of the country. This forced the government to flee to the south, eventually fleeing to Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia has become an indispensable partner for Yemen, which is why the country is leading a coalition with the United Arab Emirates, with the aim of restoring power to the Yemeni government.
In a new United Nations report, published last Saturday by the United Nations Security Council, experts from the International Agency reported that more than 2,000 children recruited by the Houthis have been killed on the battlefield between early January 2020 and May 2021. The experts reported that they received a list of more than 1,500 children recruited by Houthi rebels throughout 2020 and later received a list of more than 500 children recruited between January and May last year. "They were between 10 and 17 years old," the experts said, and "a significant number" of the children were killed in Amran, Dhamar, Hajjah, Hodeida, Ibb, Sa'ada and Sanaa.
The Houthi rebels are supported by Iran, as well as the various camps and courses where they encourage young people to fight, "in one camp, children as young as 7 years old were taught how to clean weapons and evade rockets," said one of the experts. In fact, the Houthis spread their ideology through summer camps in schools and in a mosque, according to the UN experts' research. In such places, the rebels recruit children for future participation in the war against the internationally recognised government of Yemen, which is supported by Saudi Arabia. "Children are instructed to shout the Houthi slogan, 'Death to America, death to Israel, curse the Jews, victory to Islam' ", the UN panel of experts said.
The experts documented the cases of 10 children who were taken to the war to fight after being told that they would be enrolled in or were already taking cultural courses. In 9 of the 10 cases, humanitarian assistance was provided or denied to families "solely on the basis of whether their children participated in the fighting or to teachers on the basis of whether they taught the Houthi curriculum", while in the remaining case a crime of sexual violence was found to have been committed against a child undergoing military training.
UN experts have also expressed the continuation of air and sea attacks against Saudi Arabia, both near the border and inside the country, albeit less frequently. The Houthis generally employ a combination of unmanned drones and short-range artillery rockets, as well as the use of longer-range drones, cruise and ballistic missiles, experts said.
Recently launching an attack on the United Arab Emirates, experts said they used waterborne improvised explosive devices to target commercial ships anchored in Saudi ports, in some cases more than 1,000 kilometres from Yemeni shores. "It appears almost certain that these devices were launched from a 'mother ship', which would have towed the devices for most of the journey," the experts reported. "The purpose of these attacks was primarily political, in other words, the Houthis want to push Riyadh towards accepting a political agreement beneficial to them," the experts said. They said that "this contrasts sharply with the use of missiles and unmanned aerial vehicles inside Yemen, which often aim for maximum lethality".
Yemen is in a state of maximum humanitarian severity, with its citizens bearing the brunt of the damage, despite the international aid they are receiving. Since the beginning of the civil war in Yemen, the United Nations has not ceased to denounce the situation in the country, but above all, the terrible impact of the war on children.
