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YEMEN-RIGHTS-TRIAL
Yemen rebels sentence four journalists to death
SANAA, April 11, 2020 (BSS/AFP) – A court run by Yemen’s Huthi
rebels sentenced four journalists to death on Saturday for “treason”
and espionage, a judicial official said.
The court in Huthi-held capital Sanaa “sentenced four journalists to
death on charges of treason and spying for foreign states”, the
official told AFP on condition of anonymity.
Yemen’s internationally recognised government slammed the ruling.
“We strongly condemn the illegal death sentences” in a trial lacking
“min. standard of justice & integrity”, information minister Moammar
Al-Eryani wrote on Twitter.
He named the journalists as Abdelkhaleq Omran, Akram Al Walidi,
Harith Hamid, and Tawfiq Al Mansouri.
The Iran-backed Huthis seized Sanaa from government forces in 2014,
prompting a Saudi-led military intervention the following year.
The ensuing war has killed tens of thousands and plunged the Arab
world’s poorest country into what the United Nations calls the worst
humanitarian disaster globally.
Amnesty International says the Huthis have been holding 10
journalists in detention since 2015.
In a report last month, the rights watchdog criticised the rebels’
Specialised Criminal Court, which issued Saturday’s ruling.
Naming the four journalists sentenced on Saturday along with six
others, it said they had been “prosecuted on trumped-up spying charges
for peacefully exercising their right to freedom of expression”.
“Journalists, human rights defenders, political opponents and
members of religious minorities are among those subjected to unfair
trial on spurious or trumped-up charges by this court,” Amnesty said.
It said accusations of spying carried mandatory death sentences
under Yemeni law.
BSS/AFP/MRU/2129hrs