The issue of enforced disappearances in Yemen has once again come to the forefront amid the waning influence of the Southern Transitional Council and its affiliated military formations backed by the United Arab Emirates (UAE). This development follows the takeover by forces aligned with the internationally recognized government of the temporary capital, Aden, as well as the southern and eastern governorates, a shift that has offered victims’ families a renewed sense of hope in learning the fate of their missing relatives.
Alkarama has repeatedly drawn attention to the issue of enforced disappearances in Yemen, a practice that has proliferated with each cycle of political conflict the country has experienced over the past decades.
In this regard, Alkarama welcomes the directives recently issued by the Chairman of the Yemeni Presidential Leadership Council, Rashad Al-Alimi, calling for the closure of all prisons and unlawful detention facilities in governorates under the authority of the internationally recognized government, as well as the immediate release of individuals detained outside the bounds of the law. According to official government media, these measures form part of a broader process intended to restore state authority and ensure respect for human rights.
According to the presidential directive, security and military bodies, in coordination with the Public Prosecution and the Ministry of Justice, have been mandated to identify unlawful detention sites in the governorates of Aden, Lahj and Al-Dhalea, and to develop an urgent plan for their closure. This mandate includes ensuring that any detainees are transferred to officially recognized facilities operating under the law, or released where no legal grounds for their detention are established.
Nevertheless, such directives remain insufficient unless they are embedded within a clear and comprehensive framework aimed at justice and accountability for those responsible for human rights violations in the country.
These directives were issued one day after a protest organized in the temporary capital, Aden, by the families of victims of enforced disappearance, led by the Mothers of Abductees Association, calling for the disclosure of the fate of their relatives and the dismantling of secret prisons established by the United Arab Emirates.
During the protest, participants displayed photographs of individuals subjected to enforced disappearance and held banners demanding the prompt disclosure of their fate and their immediate release.
In a statement released in conjunction with the protest, the Mothers of Abductees Association emphasized that the state’s announcement of the consolidation of its political and security authority over the city of Aden entails an urgent legal and moral obligation to address the issue of the disappeared without delay.
The United Arab Emirates had established networks of secret detention facilities in multiple regions of Yemen, including clandestine detention sites at the Balhaf facility operated by the French company Total in Shabwa governorate in the southeast of the country, as well as other prisons overseen by Emirati officers and operated by militias created, funded and acting on behalf of the UAE.
Alkarama’s Activities
In this context, Alkarama has documented numerous instances of enforced disappearance in Yemen, including cases occurring in areas under the control of military formations affiliated with the United Arab Emirates.
Among these is the case of the two brothers, Mohammed Saeed Omar Al-Qamishi and Saleh Saeed Omar Al-Qamishi, who have remained subjected to enforced disappearance since their arrest by Emirati forces in the temporary capital, Aden, in September 2016. According to the family of the two brothers, they were able to see the victims at Al-Mansoura Prison in Aden in September 2016, where visible signs of torture were observed on their bodies. This visit was the only one permitted, after which their whereabouts have remained unknown to date. The detention authorities indicated that the two brothers had been transferred into the custody of Emirati forces in Aden. Since then, the family has received no communication from them and remains unaware of their fate or location.
The case of the late Yemeni preacher Abdul Qadir Al-Badiji (Al-Shaibani) further illustrates the widespread practice of abductions and enforced disappearances in southern Yemen with the support of the United Arab Emirates. Alkarama submitted this case to the Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances (WGEID) on 18 November 2020. On 30 October 2020, armed men in the city of Aden affiliated with the Security Belt Forces, which at the time exercised control over the city and were supported by the United Arab Emirates, abducted Mr. Abdul Qader Al-Shaibani, aged 65. He was taken in the presence of his wife and one of his sons to an undisclosed location, where he remained subjected to enforced disappearance until his release approximately nine months later. He passed away only a few weeks thereafter.
At a later stage, Salem Al-Rubaizi, a former Yemeni detainee held in secret detention facilities operated by the United Arab Emirates in southern Yemen, disclosed that he had been subjected to severe psychological and physical torture by Emirati interrogators during his detention in a secret prison located at the Balhaf oil facility operated by the French company Total in Shabwa governorate. Mr. Al-Rubaizi, whose family had been in contact with Alkarama, provided a harrowing account of the torture he endured while detained at the Balhaf facility, from which the UAE withdrew only days ago. He was arrested by the Emirati-backed Shabwani Elite Forces on 10 June 2019, transferred between multiple detention sites, and subjected to electric shocks and severe beatings in an effort to coerce him into making a fabricated confession accusing him of espionage on behalf of a foreign state, prior to his release in early April 2021.
In this context, Alkarama, together with Yemeni and international human rights organizations, issued a joint statement on the occasion of the International Day of the Victims of Enforced Disappearances, calling for urgent action to secure the release of all individuals arbitrarily detained by all parties to the conflict in Yemen, in a manner that safeguards their dignity, safety, and security.
In their statement, the organizations urged support for accountability efforts, including through the establishment of an international criminal investigative mechanism mandated to collect, consolidate, preserve, and analyze evidence, compile case files, and identify victims of serious violations and grave crimes, including those subjected to arbitrary detention and enforced disappearance in Yemen. They further called upon all parties to guarantee detainees’ right to a fair trial, ensure their access to communication with the outside world, provide detention facilities with adequate sanitary infrastructure, and secure detainees’ access to health services and necessary medical care.
The organizations also called for the publication of official lists of all detainees who died in detention facilities and prisons, including unofficial places of detention, the issuance of death certificates for all detainees known to have died in custody on the basis of comprehensive forensic examinations, and the prompt and unhindered access of families to such documentation.