Picture of the window glass and the hole made by the bullet – Mwatana Organization
Mwatana Organization for Human Rights has called upon Yemeni authorities to urgently start a transparent investigation into the killing of Mr. Yahya Ahmed Al-Ameri (43 years old), and identify and prosecute the perpetrators.
Witnesses said to the Organization that armed Al-Houthis tried to occupy the roof of the house of Yahya Ahmed Mohammed Saeed Al-Ameri (43 years old) on Monday, September 8, 2014. He prevented the militants and had a verbal altercation with them before residents of the neighborhood interfered to prevent them.
According to a statement his family made to Mwatana Organization for Human Rights, Yahya Al-Ameri was killed at about 2 p.m. on Tuesday, September 9, 2014, while he was talking on the phone in a room on the fourth floor of his house, trying to alert his relatives not to go out into the street amid the clashes.
A bullet came through the window glass (where he had been standing and which is located opposite one of the buildings occupied by Al-Houthi militants) and hit him directly in the right side of his face. When he was shot, the soldiers were spread in various parts of the neighborhood, and fighting had escalated to its peak.
Due to the ongoing fierce clashes and lack of means of transport, his family had difficulty taking him to hospital at the time, and he was shifted to hospital on a vehicle used for transporting domestic gas refills. The militants of Al-Houthi Group advised them to stick to a particular road leading to the hospital, and avoid the main road owing to the clashes.
The Al-Ameri’s widow said that about a dozen Al-Houthi militants came back after only about 15 minutes from taking her husband to hospital and attempted to occupy the roof of the house again. The women who were present in the house, however, prevented the militants from entering the house through their screams and calls for help, and the militants left immediately.
Abdul Rashid Al-Faqih, Executive Director of Mwatana Organization for Human Rights, stated that the militants’ occupation of residential neighborhoods exposes civilians to serious dangers the responsibility for which is borne by the clashing parties and that such practices are in violation of international humanitarian law as regards the rules of war.
Mwatana Organization for Human Rights has quoted witnesses in Hizyaz Area who maintained that militants of Ansar Allah – Al-Houthis – had on Monday and Tuesday (8 and 9 September 2014) occupied Abdullatif Al-Hamad School in Nadi Al-Forousiyah (Jockey Club) Neighborhood, Al-Wahdah (Unity) School in Al-Wahdah Area, and Al-Hussein School.
The militants turned the schools into barracks during their clashes with the security forces and the army in Hizyaz Area at the southern outskirts of Sana’a City. They also occupied the roofs of a number of houses in Nadi Al-Forousiyah Neighborhood and used them as sites of combat.
According to statements by residents of Nadi Al-Forousiyah Neighborhood – Hizyaz Area – to the Organization’s investigation team which visited the neighborhood on Wednesday, September 10th, 2014, militants of Ansar Allah tried to ascend the roofs of their homes by force in order to turn them into barracks in the clashes that broke out in the neighborhood on Monday and Tuesday, 8 and 9 September, between the security forces and the army on the one hand and the militants on the other hand. Altercations between the militants and the neighborhood residents ended in preventing the militants from mounting some of the houses.
The militants, however, occupied some other houses, including buildings that were still under construction and vacated buildings. It is to be noted that the neighborhood witnessed sporadic clashes on Tuesday and Wednesday which led to the displacement of families from their homes and sparked panic among the civilian population.
According to the Office of the Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General for Children and Disarmament, “under International Humanitarian Law, schools and hospitals should be protected as these are civilian facilities.” Following the International Humanitarian Law, it is prohibited by all parties involved in an armed conflict to use civilian facilities, including schools, so long as these are not used for military purposes.
Besides, all conflicting parties are committed to taking all feasible precautions to ensure the protection of the civilian population and facilities under their control against the effects of any attacks. Further, it is unlawful to use schools as military barracks and educational facilities at the same time.
During his speech in April 2009, the President of the Security Council declared that: “The Security Council … calls upon conflicting parties to refrain from any actions that would impede children's education, particularly the use of schools in military operations”.
