Yemeni Minister of Information, Culture and Tourism Muammar Al-Eryani held Iran-backed terrorist Houthi militia fully responsible for the safety of four Yemeni journalists it had abducted. In a statement to the Yemeni News Agency (Saba), Al-Eryani said that the terrorist Houthi militia has forcibly taken away the four journalists, banned visits to them and transferred them to unknown detention. Al-Eryani noted that information available shows that the Houthi militia transferred the journalists to solitary confinement and tortured them by hanging and beating them with iron sticks and electric wires in sensitive organs, citing the deterioration of their health after the terrorist militia denied medication to them for diseases they contracted during their 6-year detention period. He called on the international community, UN and US envoys, human rights organizations and organization of journalists protection and all journalists to condemn the abduction of the four journalists by the Houthi militia and their forcible disappearance, urging these institutions to mount pressure on militia leaders to release them immediately and unconditionally. Six journalists were released during the latest major successful prisoner swap between the Houthis and the Yemeni government last year. The six freed journalists previously reported being subjected to the same level of torture by the Houthi captors inside different prisons in Sanaa. They urged the international community to pressure the Iran-backed rebels to release the four journalists who face the death penalty. Al-Eryani also condemned the Houthi abduction of singer Youssef Al-Badji in Sanaa and the militia's escalating crackdown on music. "The Iran-backed Houthi militia abducted singer Youssef Al-Badji from his house in Sanaa in a systematic campaign to target art, pursue and attack artists, push dozens of them to flee outside the country, and prevent singing at weddings and public events and classify it as a taboo," the minister said in a tweet. — Agencies
