“Islah” Party’s gunmen confiscate “Al-Sharea” newspaper, threatening arson of newsstands

Cairo: 5 December 2019

The Arabic Network for Human Rights Information (ANHRI) condemned, today, the confiscation of “Al-Sharea” newspaper’s issue of Tuesday, 3 December 2019 by some gunmen affiliated with Yemen’s Reform Party (Islah), threatening owners of newsstands and bookstores in the city of Taiz to prevent them from selling or circulating the newspaper.

Yesterday evening (Wednesday), a group of armed militias belonging to the anti-Houthi  “Islah” Party confiscated the Tuesday (3 December 2019)’s issue of “Al-Sharea” newspaper. They also threatened owners of newsstands and bookstores to burn down their stalls if they try to re-sell the newspaper’s issue. The confiscation is linked to the newspaper publishing a report on alleged corruption committed by these armed factions affiliated to the Reform (Islah) Party; as the confiscated issue of the newspaper published the second episode of an expanded interview with Brigadier General “Adnan Hammadi” affiliated to the government of President “Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi”. It also published a report about the assassination attempt that “al-Hammadi” survived last Monday; for being one of the military leaders of “Hadi” government opposing Houthis in the Yemeni province of Taiz.

The threat and confiscation took place yesterday constitutes part of an earlier campaign of intimidation carried out by the same military group of the Reform Party on November 25, when they headed to a number of bookstores and newsstands and threatened their owners to burn down their stores if they continue to sell “Al-Sharea” newspaper.

Al-Sharea newspaper, noteworthy, is considered one of the most important independent newspapers in Yemen. It had been suspended since 2015 following the conflict between the Iranian-backed Houthi group and the Saudi-backed government of Abd Rabbo Mansour, before it returned back a few weeks ago becoming the target of crackdown and confiscation by the armed militias.

ANHRI said, “These criminal practices and violations eliminate what is left from press freedom in Yemen. The Islah/Reform Party and all conflicting parties have to put an end to such criminal practices that largely endanger the freedom of the press as well as freedom of opinion and expression and violate the right of Yemeni citizens to information, aside from establishing the principle of impunity in the country”.