Yemen government, Houthis swap hundreds of prisoners

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Updated 15 October 2020
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Yemen government, Houthis swap hundreds of prisoners

  • Pompeo thanks King Salman’s diplomatic efforts as two Americans freed
  • UN Yemen envoy Martin Griffiths and international aid workers expressed their happiness over the swap

AL-MUKALLA: The internationally recognized Yemeni government and the Iran-backed Houthis on Thursday swapped 484 prisoners, including 15 Saudis, two Americans and four Sudanese in the first phase of a deal to release hundreds of prisoners, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), government officials and residents said.

The released Saudis and Sudanese arrived later at the King Salman air base in Riyadh.

Mike Pompeo, US secretary of state, said in a statement: “Today, we join with all Americans in welcoming the release of two US citizens from Houthi custody in Yemen.

“My deepest condolences go out to the family of a third American who died while in captivity, but whose remains are being repatriated.”

He added: “I would like to thank Sultan Haitham bin Tariq of Oman, King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman of Saudi Arabia for their diplomatic efforts. I also want to commend the tenacious diplomacy of our embassies in the region who helped facilitate this release.”

Pompeo added: “Today’s news is the latest affirmation that President Trump remains committed to bringing every American held hostage or wrongfully detained abroad back home. This administration will not rest until they are all reunited with their families.”

ICRC planes carrying hundreds of prisoners departed from Seiyun airport in the government-controlled province of Hadramout and landed at Sanaa airport. 

The freed prisoners are part of 1,081 prisoners who were set to be released under UN-brokered talks in Switzerland last month. The remaining prisoners would be transported on the same planes between Sanaa and Seiyun on Friday, officials said.  

The ICRC said on Twitter that the organization along with the Yemeni Red Crescent and the Saudi Red Crescent Authority completed on Thursday the transfer of 484 freed prisoners between Saudi Arabia, Sanaa and Seiyun.

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READ MORE: Arab coalition says Yemeni prisoner swap ‘positive’ step

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“This is an achievement. But the greater achievement will be when we empty Houthi prisons from all abductees. I hope this is the first step toward achieving all for all prisoner swap,” Majed Fadhail, deputy minister of human rights and a member of the government delegation in the talks, told Arab News. Thursday’s prisoner swap is the largest since the government and the Houthis signed the Stockholm Agreement in December 2018.

At Seiyun airport, dozens of government officials stood by the tarmac to greet the freed prisoners. Outside the airport, a large number of relatives waved the Yemeni flag before greeting their liberated relatives.

Speaking to Arab News from Seiyun airport, Entesar Saleh, a member of the Abductees' Mothers Association, a Yemeni civil society and human rights organization and a relative of a former abductee at Houthi prisons, said the organization’s long advocacy campaigns, pressure and protests have yielded freedom for a small number of prisoners, adding that the Houthis are still holding more than 3,000 abductees. “I cannot find words to describe my happiness today,” Entesar said.

Fadhail said that the government offered “major” concessions to convince the Houthis to include some abducted journalists to the list of freed government prisoners, adding that the Houthis strongly refused to free five journalists who were sentenced to death in April.

Abdullah Mansour, brother of journalist Tawfeq Mansour, told Arab News that he and his family were sad when they did not see him among the freed prisoners. “After long discussions and peace talks, only this small number of abductees are freed? This humanitarian issue has unfortunately become a bargaining chip,” he said, urging the international community and the Yemeni government to mount pressure on the Houthis until they release the remaining abductees.

Yemeni government officials expressed concerns that freed Houthi fighters might return to the battlefield. Separately, Najeeb Ghallab, undersecretary at Yemen’s Information Ministry and a political analyst, told Arab News that most of the freed abductees from Houthi prisoners are journalists, activists and businessmen who were kidnapped from their homes inside Houthi-controlled territories. “This is an important humanitarian achievement despite offering big concessions,” Ghallab said.

The UN Yemen envoy Martin Griffiths and international aid workers expressed their happiness over the swap: “Today’s release operation, led by the International Committee of the Red Cross, is another sign that peaceful dialogue can deliver. I congratulate the families who will soon be welcoming their long-awaited loved ones.”

Jan Egeland, secretary-general of the Norwegian Refugee Council, tweeted: “Wonderful news from Yemen. Prisoner exchanges will reduce suffering and increase hopes for reconciliation, confidence-building and peace where there now is only mistrust and violence. Good luck.”


Syria’s Aleppo International Airport reopens for domestic, international flights

Updated 3 sec ago
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Syria’s Aleppo International Airport reopens for domestic, international flights

  • The first passenger flight from Damascus landed after the country’s second major hub reopened for air traffic on Tuesday

LONDON: The Syrian Arab Republic reopened the country’s second major airport for flights after nearly three months of closure.

The first passenger flight from Damascus landed at Aleppo International Airport after it reopened for air traffic on Tuesday, amid an official ceremony attended by representatives of Syria’s new interim government, the SANA news agency reported.

The airport was closed in November during the offensive by rebel groups against the regime of Bashar Assad in early December.

Syrian authorities have conducted maintenance and restoration work over the past three months to resume air traffic to and from Aleppo, the country’s second largest city after the capital and an important industrial and trade center.

Authorities announced that Aleppo will begin receiving international flights, facilitating the return of nearly 10 million Syrian refugees currently living in Turkey and Europe. It will also enable the visits of local and foreign investors to the city, SANA added.

Alaa Sallal, the director of relations at the Syrian Civil Aviation Authority, said efforts are underway to expand Aleppo International Airport’s services “to turn it into a key air gateway in Syria capable of handling more flights and connecting the country to the world.”

In January, international flights to and from Damascus resumed for the first time since the fall of Assad with a direct flight from Doha — the first in 13 years.


Netanyahu coalition jeopardized over ultra-Orthodox exemption from army

Updated 36 min 19 sec ago
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Netanyahu coalition jeopardized over ultra-Orthodox exemption from army

  • The government must pass the budget by the end of the month or call snap elections
  • United Torah Judaism holds seven seats in the Knesset, Israel’s parliament

BNEI BRAK, Israel: One of Israel’s most divisive domestic issues has reared itself again to challenge Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, after a group in the ruling coalition said it would bring the government down unless it exempts ultra-Orthodox Jews from army service.
Some members of United Torah Judaism, one of two ultra-Orthodox Jewish parties in the coalition, said in a letter that they would vote against the budget if the government did not pass a new law formalising exemptions for religious students.
“If this matter is once again sidelined or delayed for any reason, we will not be able to continue as partners in the coalition,” said the March 6 letter signed by Housing Minister and party chairman Yitzhak Goldknopf and two others.
The government must pass the budget by the end of the month or call snap elections. United Torah Judaism holds seven seats in the Knesset, Israel’s parliament.
It is too early to predict the consequences. Netanyahu, Israel’s longest-serving prime minister, is a proven master at smoothing over disagreements in his coalitions. An ultra-nationalist group that quit the government over the ceasefire in Gaza in January announced on Tuesday it was returning.
But pollster Mitchell Barak, who worked for Netanyahu in the 1990s, said this time ultra-Orthodox politicians appeared unwilling to compromise, and the prime minister might have to look outside the coalition for support to pass the budget, an extraordinary step.
“He’s going to look for someone who can compromise, save him, and be that ‘freyer’,” he said, speaking before the ultra-nationalists announced their return to the coalition and using a Yiddish word for someone who lets others take advantage of him. “That’s how he operates.”
The prime minister’s office declined to comment on the ultra-Orthodox ultimatum and whether he believed the budget could pass without their support.

MILITARY STRAINED
In Israel, military service is mandatory at age 18, after which Israelis become reservists liable to be called up for training or deployment.
But dating back to Israel’s founding in 1948 it made an exemption for ultra-Orthodox communities, known as Haredim, whose young men mainly dedicate their lives to studying religious texts in academies known as yeshivot.
Those communities were initially small but have grown rapidly in the following decades. According to government data, there are now 1.4 million Haredim, accounting for about 14 percent of the population, deepening resentment among other Israelis who are conscripted.
In 2017, the Supreme Court ruled that the exemption was unconstitutional, and last year it ordered the military to conscript yeshiva students. Legal experts say the only way to restore the exemption would be to pass a new law enshrining it.
Members of the Haredi community say they would resist any attempt to conscript their children.
“They can put us in prison,” said Yehoshua Menuchin at his home in Bnei Brak, a densely populated city close to Tel Aviv where many Haredim live.
Menuchin, who has a 19-year-old son who is not serving, said the debate was driven by politics, rather than by genuine military need.
“If it’s a matter of survival, like an Arab invasion, then the Haredim will be the first to volunteer in order to save lives. But as long as it is political, it won’t ever happen.”
But 18 months into war in Gaza and major military operations in the West Bank and Lebanon, resentment is growing, and many lawmakers say the exemption is unjustifiable.
“They don’t know what 30 days of reserve duty a year is, and they don’t know what it is to dread that knock on the door,” centrist opposition lawmaker Elazar Stern, a former general, told Reuters, referring to the moment a parent learns of a child’s death in service.

DIVINE INTERVENTION
The Haredim live in insular neighborhoods centered around strict religious observance, with their own schools that largely eschew math and science. They have twice as many children as the national average, rely heavily on state welfare and charity, and those who work are often in low-paying jobs.
They believe that sending their children to the military is an existential threat, fearing that exposure to secular Israelis and outside influences could undermine their way of life.
“I know one thing: we must go the way the Torah instructs us,” said Meir Zvi Bergman, one of Israel’s most widely followed Haredi rabbis. “God does not want us to go, so we won’t go.”
The army says it is working to create conditions to make it easier for more Haredim to serve, such as dedicated battalions with strict religious practices, including regular prayer and gender segregation.
“The responsibility to defend the country must be shared fairly,” Eyal Zamir, Israel’s new chief of the military staff, said in a speech this month taking up his post. (Reporting by Alexander Cornwell, additional reporting by Maayan Lubell and Steven Scheer)


South Sudan party partially withdraws from peace process

Updated 18 March 2025
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South Sudan party partially withdraws from peace process

  • “The ongoing political witch-hunts continue to threaten the very essence and the existence of the (peace deal),” Pierino said
  • The fighting around Nasir in Upper Nile state has displaced 50,000 people since late February, according to the UN Humanitarian Coordinator

NAIROBI: A major party in South Sudan’s coalition government said on Tuesday it had suspended its role in a key element of a 2018 peace deal as relations between its leader Riek Machar and President Salva Kiir deteriorate amid clashes and arrests.
The agreement ended a five-year war between forces loyal to Kiir and his rival Machar, who now serves as First Vice President leading the SPLM-IO party. But the two men have a fractious relationship, which has worsened in recent weeks following clashes in the country’s east.
Earlier this month security forces rounded up several SPLM-IO officials, including the petroleum minister and the deputy head of the army, after the White Army ethnic militia forced troops to withdraw from the town of Nasir near the Ethiopian border.
The government has accused the SPLM-IO of links with the White Army, which mostly comprises armed ethnic Nuer youths who fought alongside Machar’s forces in the 2013-2018 war against predominantly ethnic Dinka troops loyal to Kiir. The party denies the allegations.
Oyet Nathaniel Pierino, deputy chairman of the SPLM-IO, said on Tuesday the party would not participate in security arrangements tied to the peace process until the detained officials were released.
“The ongoing political witch-hunts continue to threaten the very essence and the existence of the (peace deal),” Pierino said in a statement.
The fighting around Nasir in Upper Nile state has displaced 50,000 people since late February, of which 10,000 have fled to Ethiopia, according to Anita Kiki Gbeho, the United Nations Humanitarian Coordinator in South Sudan.

RAMPANT HATE SPEECH
South Sudan’s United Nations peacekeeping chief Nicholas Haysom said he was concerned the country was “on the brink of relapse into civil war.”
“With the proliferation of mis/disinformation in the public domain, hate speech is now rampant, raising concerns that the conflict could assume an ethnic dimension,” he said in a speech to the African Union.
Analysts say the war in neighboring Sudan has also spurred the breakdown of the peace process, with South Sudan’s oil revenues suspended, escalating regional tensions and arms flooding across the border.
“Already we are seeing the initial stages of spillover fighting in Upper Nile from the Sudan war. It will be difficult to prevent those tensions from spreading to (the capital) Juba,” said Alan Boswell from the International Crisis Group.


Families urge Israel PM to ‘stop the killing’ of Gaza hostages

Updated 18 March 2025
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Families urge Israel PM to ‘stop the killing’ of Gaza hostages

  • The Hostages and Missing Families Forum said it had received no response to its request to meet with Netanyahu
  • “Now it becomes clear — the public officials did not meet with them because they were planning the explosion of the ceasefire”

JERUSALEM: Relatives of Israeli hostages in Gaza accused Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu Tuesday of sacrificing their loved ones by carrying out a wave of deadly strikes that threatened a fragile truce.
The Hostages and Missing Families Forum said it had received no response to its request to meet with Netanyahu and other officials to hear how the remaining hostages would be “protected from the military pressure.”
“Now it becomes clear — the public officials did not meet with them because they were planning the explosion of the ceasefire, which could sacrifice their family members,” the campaign group said.
Of the 251 hostages seized during Hamas’s unprecedented October 2023 attack which sparked the war, 58 are still held in Gaza, including 34 the Israeli military says are dead.
The overngith air strikes were by far the deadliest since a January ceasefire that largely halted the fighting and saw the handover of 33 hostages, both alive and dead, in exchange for Palestinian prisoners.
The health ministry in the Hamas-controlled territory said at least 413 people were killed in the strikes.
The forum called on supporters of the hostages to cemonstrate outside Netanyahu’s office in Jerusalem, warning that “military pressure could further endanger their lives and complicate efforts to bring them back safe and sound.”
“The families of the hostages will demand: Stop the killing and disappearance of the hostages now! First, return them — then everything else.”
The return of the hostages is a priority for the majority of Israelis.
“This morning, the moment we realized that we were going back to war, the first thing I thought about was: what about the hostages? This is a death sentence for the hostages, and it’s simply terrible,” said Muriel Aranov, a 62-year-old pensioner living in Tel Aviv.
As protesters headed to Jerusalem, Netanyahu took part in a security assessment with defense officials in Tel Aviv, including Defense Minister Israel Katz, his office said.
An earlier statement from Netanyahu’s office said the strikes were ordered after “Hamas’s repeated refusal to release our hostages, as well as its rejection of all of the proposals it has received from US Presidential Envoy Steve Witkoff and from the mediators.”
“We are at an impasse, we have said ‘yes’ more than once to concrete proposals from the US special envoy to extend the ceasefire, and Hamas has said ‘no’,” foreign ministry spokesperson Oren Marmorstein said in a briefing.
“From now on, Israel will act against Hamas with increased military intensity,” he added.


Rafah border crossing in Gaza is closed, EU spokesperson says

Updated 18 March 2025
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Rafah border crossing in Gaza is closed, EU spokesperson says

  • EUBAM mission of the European Union has started to put in place emergency procedures

BRUSSELS: The border crossing between Egypt and the Gaza Strip in Rafah is closed, a spokesperson for the European Commission said on Tuesday.
“The crossing point is closed and the EUBAM mission of the European Union has started to put in place emergency procedures to deal with the situation as it develops,” the spokesperson told reporters in Brussels.