In a new report released today, SAM said Saudi Arabia is arresting hundreds of Yemeni people in prisons, some of which are illegal, in the Kingdom. It also supervises other prisons inside Yemen.
According to the 64-page report entitled "Yemeni in Saudi Prisons," SAM's team received dozens of communications and heard more than 100 testimonies, whether on the phone or on WhatsApp, or interviews with victims and witnesses political, military and security leaders and activists, and collected and analysed dozens of documents, interviews, photographs, medical and technical reports of victims. It is worth pointing out that SAM research team has faced many difficulties and worked in a complex environment for prolonged periods of time because of the difficulty and complexity of the detainees file, and also because the responsible parties rely upon confidentiality in the first place and firmness managing this file.
SAM stressed that there is no precise number of detainees or forcibly disappeared persons in these prisons, because there are no records that can be used to backtrack the information or specialized government or civilian authorities that can return to them. The field team monitored various groups who had been arbitrarily arrested and forcibly disappeared, and some who had been tortured, including journalists, politicians, officers, military personnel and civilians, for various reasons, some for publishing their opinions online and others for terrorism-related charges.
The report mentioned the most important prisons and detention facilities in which Yemeni people were held in Saudi prisons or under Saudi Arabia's supervision, the most important of which were:
1)" Alteen" prison in the city of Seiyun.
2) Airport prison, located inside Al Ghaydah
airport in Mahara Governorate.
3) Air Force Prison, located in the Saudi Jizan region.
4) Military Intelligence Prison.
5) Fatah Brigade prison in the southern border.
6) Fifth Brigade prison in the southern border as well.
7) State Security Investigation Prison in Riyadh.
8) Dhahban detention facility , also known as " The General Detective Prison in Dhahban" which is located near the Dhahban district in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.
The report confirmed that many, and indeed most, of those SAM spoke to had been tortured, subjected to degrading treatment, and that some of them had even died of torture, such as Yemeni coast guard officer Ibrahim al-Shamsan.
Tawfiq al-Hamidi, President of SAM Organization, said that "the new report is a rights-based one that reflects the anguish and pain of the families of detainees, some of whom do not know the fate of their relatives. He also called on Saudi Arabia to take a positive approach and to move quickly to examine the files of detainees and give them all their legal rights, including fair compensations also we cannot absolve the Yemeni government of responsibility, its flawed and inappropriate stigma of a government based on a constitution that is bound to defend its citizens.
The report contained in detail several cases of detainees in Saudi Arabian prisons or prisons within Yemeni territory supervised by Saudi forces, such as the case of the journalist Marwan Al-Marisi, Colonel Rashad Al-Hamiri, Officer Ibrahim Al-Shamsani and the case of Yemeni sailors, and others in Alteen prisons, Al Ghaydah airport and the southern border.
In conclusion, SAM called on Saudi Arabia to immediately cease its practices in violation of fundamental rights and international law against Yemenis and to release all detainees from political backgrounds or claims and to refer all those involved in the crimes of arbitrary detention, forced disappearance and the torture of Yemenis in its prisons or prisons under its supervision for criminal investigation. It also called on the Panel of Eminent Experts to include the file of the Yemeni prisoners in Saudi prisons during the war in its annual report.