Yemen

Conflict Overview

Yemen has been effectively split between the Houthis, an armed group that controls the north of the country, including the capital, Sana’a, and the internationally recognized government (IRG) that largely controlled the remainder (aside from a portion of the south under the control of Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP). Although the situation may change in the future, for the purpose of this reporting period, the IRG is considered the authority representing the State of Yemen.

The armed conflict began in 2014 when Houthi rebels with links to Iran and a history of rising up against the government took control of Yemen’s capital, demanding lower fuel prices and a new government. The rebels seized the presidential palace in January 2015, leading the then president, Abd Rabbu Mansour Hadi, and his government to exile. In March 2015, a coalition of Gulf states led by Saudi Arabia and with significant United Arab Emirates (UAE) involvement launched airstrikes against the Houthis.¹

With the tacit renewal of the United Nations (UN)-brokered truce agreed in 2022, the non-international armed conflict (NIAC) between the Houthis and the IRG continued to be relatively quiet during the reporting period. Despite sporadic exchanges of fire, drone strikes, and physical incursions, the frontlines remained relatively stable.² Operations in the Red Sea and retaliatory operations by Israel and the United States (US), however, led to a suspension of peace talks between the Houthis and the IRG, preventing progress towards a peaceful settlement of the conflict and even threatening a resumption of major hostilities.³

Key Events since July 2024

Houthi attacks against commercial shipping in the Red Sea and on Israeli territory led, for the first time, to Israel’s direct involvement in Yemen, with drone strikes mainly targeting Red Sea port infrastructure, Sana’a International Airport, and power stations. The first Israeli attacks on Yemen in July 2024 marked a key development in the conflicts in the Middle East. On 30 July, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) addressed to all parties to the conflicts in the region a rare call for de-escalation and the protection of civilians.⁴ Although Houthi attacks halted for nearly two months during the temporary ceasefire agreed between Israel and Hamas, they resumed in March 2025, breaking the truce when Israel suspended humanitarian access for Gaza.⁵

In December 2023, the United States established a naval coalition, joined by the United Kingdom and several other States and called ‘Operation Prosperity Guardian’, to respond to Houthi strikes on ships in the Red Sea.⁶ Subsequently, an intense campaign of United Kingdom (UK) and US airstrikes, which the two States termed ‘Operation Poseidon Archer’, took place in late 2024.⁷ The frequency and intensity of the strikes significantly intensified in the second quarter of 2025, during ‘Operation Rough Rider’, causing an unprecedented peak in civilian casualties, until agreement was reached on 6 May 2025 between the United States and the Houthis as a result of mediation by Oman.⁸

Beginning on 15 March 2025, there was a claimed shift in US policy away from the targeting of Houthi infrastructure (as had been the case under President Joe Biden) to direct targeting of Houthi leaders.⁹ Military experts argued that Israeli and UK/US airstrikes had ‘limited impact’ on the military capabilities of the Houthis.¹⁰ Indeed, the group had managed to deploy hypersonic ballistic missiles capable of penetrating Israeli air defences by the end of 2024.¹¹ The Panel of Experts on Yemen established by the UN Security Council concluded that the Houthis had improved the accuracy of their attacks against shipping in the Red Sea.¹²

As the year was ending, the IRG’s grip on the south had weakened. In late December 2025, the Southern Transitional Council (STC), a separatist group supported by the United Arab Emirates (UAE), seized large swathes of territory in Hadramawt and Al-Mahrah provinces. The STC is seeking to revive the former State of South Yemen.¹³ Following an offensive in early January, however, the IRG claimed it had recaptured the south and east of the country from the STC, even as thousands of people rallied in the city of Aden in support of the group.¹⁴

The Humanitarian Situation

The economic and humanitarian situation in Yemen remained critical throughout the reporting period – and arguably even worsened.¹⁵ The UN Panel of Experts reported that gross domestic product per capita had more than halved since the conflict first erupted in 2015.¹⁶ According to Oxfam, the country is facing ‘economic collapse’, with the price of basic commodities rising dramatically in recent years.¹⁷ The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) estimated that 19.5 million Yemenis were in need of humanitarian aid and protection in 2025.¹⁸

For May to August 2025, the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) had predicted that nearly half of the Yemeni population – 17.1 million of almost 35 million – were facing acute food insecurity (at IPC Phase 3 or above), with more than five million in a situation of emergency (IPC Phase 4).¹⁹ Projections for May 2025–February 2026 indicated a worsening trend, with more than 40,000 people facing famine (IPC Phase 5) in the governorates of Hajjah and Hudaydah, both of which are under Houthi control.²⁰ According to UNICEF, half of all children under five are acutely malnourished in Yemen, with more than 537,000 suffering from severe acute malnutrition.²¹ The first half of 2025 also saw a rise in cases of cholera and acute watery diarrhoea.²²

The causes of food insecurity are diverse, but include conflict-related insecurity and displacement, economic collapse, frequent climate shocks, and a dramatic decrease in humanitarian assistance. Airstrikes against critical civilian infrastructure, including ports in the Red Sea and Sana’a International Airport, have disrupted trade and humanitarian relief, lowering the number of essential goods that can be imported.²³ The US government’s designation of the Houthis as a foreign terrorist organization in early 2025 further diverted shipping away from Houthi-controlled ports to the port of Aden, making it more difficult to adequately supply the population in the north.²⁴

US funding cuts have shut down many life-saving assistance and protection services, including treatment for malnourished children.²⁵ In May 2025, OCHA issued an emergency funding call for its Yemen 2025 Humanitarian Needs and Response Plan, having received only nine per cent of the total US$2.5 billion it was seeking.²⁶ It stressed that, without adequate support, six million more Yemenis would experience emergency levels of food insecurity and that 771 health facilities ‘would stop functioning’, meaning 6.9 million people would not have access to primary and secondary healthcare.²⁷

Conflict Classification and Applicable Law

An international armed conflict (IAC) existed between Israel and Yemen during the reporting period owing to the lack of consent from the IRG (the Presidential Leadership Council) for Israel to use force on the territory of Yemen against the Houthis. This IAC was regulated by customary international humanitarian law (IHL), in particular Hague Law rules governing the conduct of hostilities.

Five non-international armed conflicts occurred during the reporting period:

Yemen (IRG) and affiliated forces (including militias composing the Joint Forces on the Western Coast) v Houthis.²⁸
Yemen (IRG) v Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP)
Yemen (IRG) v Southern Transitional Council (STC) (conflict ended in January 2026)
United States and United Kingdom v Houthis.
Israel v Houthis.

Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions of 1949 and other rules of customary IHL apply to all four NIACs. Yemen is also a State Party to Additional Protocol II of 1977,²⁹ which also applies to its NIAC against the Houthis as the group meets the additional requirements of Article 1(1) of the Protocol – specifically the need for a level of territorial control that would enable it to sustain military operations and implement the Protocol.

Although AQAP continued to attack southern forces and expanded its operational capabilities, it suffered leadership losses in 2024. Similarly, the Houthis had been accused of collaborating with AQAP in May 2024 by providing weapons and releasing imprisoned members of AQAP, allegedly with the shared goal of taking control of southern Yemen.³⁰ In November 2025, AQAP attacks were said to have ‘surged’.³¹ Nevertheless, AQAP does not, for the time being, exercise sufficient territorial control and, accordingly, Additional Protocol II does not apply to the armed conflict between Yemen and AQAP.

The Houthis mounted numerous attacks against ships travelling in the Red Sea. The attacks were directed against ships flagged to various States, not only to Israel, the United Kingdom, or the United States. It does not seem that the intensity threshold for separate NIACs was reached between the Houthis and any of the other flag States, but since the Houthis view their attacks on commercial shipping in the Red Sea as the implementation of a naval blockade against Israeli ports,³² they present a sufficient nexus with the armed conflict with Israel for them to be governed by IHL.³³

Both the Houthi authorities who control the north and the IRG, which is based in Aden, claim the right to represent the Republic of Yemen in its international relations. In terms of surface area, the Houthis control approximately one third of the nation’s territory, while until December 2025, the IRG controlled most of the remainder.³⁴ The areas under Houthi control hold more than two thirds of the Yemeni population.³⁵

The policy of most States and international organizations has been to recognize the authorities based in Aden as the de jure Government of Yemen. While not determinative, most recently in July 2025, the UN Security Council once again referred to the IRG as the ‘Government of Yemen’ in the preamble to a resolution it adopted unanimously.³⁶ While some States have informally engaged with the Houthis, only Iran appears explicitly to recognize them as Yemen’s de jure sovereign.³⁷

Under general international law, the State is effectively represented by the authority that is in effective control of the national territory and institutions. As the ICRC observed in its commentary on Article 2 of Geneva Convention III: ‘Under international law, the key condition for the existence of a government is its effectiveness, that is, its ability to exercise effectively functions usually assigned to a government within the confines of a State’s territory.’³⁸ It is a long-standing rule of international law that this is so irrespective of the international recognition of that authority – a reality reflected in Article 4(3) of Geneva Convention III.³⁹

With respect to IHL, as the ICRC states: ‘The very fact that the said government is effective and in control of most of the territory of the State concerned means that it is the de facto government and its actions have to be treated as the actions of the State it represents with all the consequences this entails for determining the existence of an international armed conflict.’⁴⁰ Unless and until a new authority gains control of the overwhelming majority of territory in the course of a NIAC or as a result of an internal coup, there is a presumption that the existing government remains sovereign.⁴¹

Thus, the IRG is the authority representing Yemen for the purpose of the application of IHL. That said, in the course of a lightning offensive in December 2025, the STC took over control of most of the south-east of Yemen in pursuit of southern independence.⁴² The prospect of conflict between Saudi Arabia and the UAE receded as the UAE withdrew its troops from Yemen, though as the year ended the STC had ignored a Saudi order to relinquish control of Hadramaut province.⁴³ However, the STC was dissolved by mid-January 2026, after the IRG, supported by Saudi Arabia, retook Hadramout.⁴⁴ As a result, the NIAC between the IRG and the STC ceased before the end of the reporting period.

Yemen has signed but not ratified the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court.

Compliance with IHL

Overview

During the period under review, IHL violations in Yemen continued to occur daily, in a prevailing climate of impunity. Within Yemen, due to restrictions on press freedom and crackdowns on civil society organizations by all parties to the conflict, independent reporting on violations of IHL has become difficult.⁴⁵ As has been said: ‘There has been virtually no accountability for violations committed by parties to the conflict.’⁴⁶ Following the decision by the UN Human Rights Council in October 2021 to end the mandate of the Group of Eminent Experts on Yemen, only the UN Panel of Experts on Yemen provided a degree of international monitoring of the human rights and IHL situation (until it submitted its final report in October 2025).

Accountability attempts in domestic jurisdictions that might promote better compliance by some of the parties to the country’s multiple armed conflicts have similarly proved ineffective.⁴⁷ For instance, efforts by NGOs to address the export of arms to Saudi Arabia and the UAE stalled before French tribunals due to judicial decisions that treat the granting of export permits as acts of State subject to State secrecy laws.⁴⁸On 19 July 2024, the administrative court of Montreuil rejected a request from several NGOs to overturn a decision by the customs administration denying the applicants access to administrative documents pertaining to the export of weapons to the States bombing Yemen.⁴⁹

In Germany, a combination of a lack of transparency by authorities regarding the granting of arms licences, a high evidentiary threshold, and the financial costs led four plaintiffs who had sought judicial review of German arms exports to Saudi Arabia and the UAE to discontinue proceedings they had initiated in 2021.⁵⁰ Amnesty International reported that Germany authorized arms and military equipment to Saudi Arabia in 2024, ‘despite a lack of accountability for serious violations of international human rights and humanitarian law in relation to the Yemen conflict’.⁵¹

Civilian Objects under Attack

Under customary IHL, attacks may only be directed against military objectives. Attacks must not be directed against civilian objects.⁵² Civilian objects are all objects that are not military objectives⁵³ and, as such, are protected against attack.⁵⁴ Military objectives are those objects which, by their nature, location, purpose or use, make an effective contribution to military action.⁵⁵

Hostilities inside Yemen continued to damage or destroy civilian objects and critical civilian infrastructure.⁵⁶ Repeated attacks on electrical-generating stations caused electricity outages. The UN Secretary-General also noted that the capacity of vital port facilities was ‘impaired, jeopardizing the humanitarian and commercial imports on which the country depended’.⁵⁷ Houthi missile strikes into Israel damaged residential buildings while attacks against commercial shipping harmed the marine environment due to resulting oil spills.⁵⁸

Houthi attacks against commercial shipping

According to Amnesty International, Houthi armed forces attacked at least fifty-seven commercial and military vessels in the Red Sea, the Gulf of Aden, and the Indian Ocean in 2024, claiming they were linked to Israel, the United Kingdom, or the United States.⁵⁹ The UN Panel of Experts reported at least twenty-five attacks between 1 August 2024 and 31 July 2025, nine of which targeted merchant vessels.⁶⁰ According to figures provided by the Houthis, the number of attacks since 7 October 2023 rose from 166 as at 11 July 2024 to 228 as at 2 October 2025.⁶¹

Attacks directed at merchant vessels flying the flag of neutral States are generally considered direct attacks against civilian objects, in violation of the IHL principle of distinction.⁶² The Houthis’ claim that it exercises belligerent rights by imposing a blockade on Israeli ports must be rejected.⁶³ In customary international law, the right to resort to naval blockade is generally reserved for States involved in IACs.⁶⁴ While the use of force by Israel on Yemen did trigger an IAC between Israel and Yemen, the non-State status of the Houthis does not entitle them to interfere with the rights of navigation of neutral States.⁶⁵ It also appears that the Houthis regularly targeted ships not even heading for Israeli ports, which they wrongly qualified as ‘Israeli’ ships.⁶⁶

According to the UN Panel of Experts, eight of the nine attacks against merchant vessels targeted ships carrying oil, liquid petroleum, gas, or chemical products, thereby creating considerable environmental risks.⁶⁷ Houthi strikes on tankers and cargo vessels, including the drone attack on 15 July 2024 against the Liberian-flagged oil tanker Chios Lion, caused oil spills in the Red Sea covering hundreds of square kilometres and posing a serious threat to marine life and ecosystems.⁶⁸ On 21 and 23 August 2024, the Houthis attacked the MV Delta Sounion, a Greek-flagged oil tanker carrying one million barrels (150,000 tons) of crude oil. The resultant fire, which lasted for several weeks until it was successfully towed to safety and salvaged, risked a massive oil spill.⁶⁹

In addition to a manifest breach of the principle of distinction due to the civilian character of these oil tankers,⁷⁰ these attacks demonstrated reckless disregard for potentially devastating environmental damage that they could have caused. This breaches the duty on parties to armed conflict to employ means and methods of warfare with due regard for the protection and preservation of the environment.⁷¹

Indiscriminate Houthi airstrikes against Israel

Between 1 August 2024 and 31 July 2025, the Houthis launched more than 220 missile and drone attacks against Israel.⁷² Although most were intercepted by Israel’s air defence systems,⁷³ some passed through, damaging infrastructure and/or killing and injuring civilians. On 19 July 2024, a Houthi Samad-3 drone struck a residential building in Tel Aviv, killing one civilian and wounding several others.⁷⁴ As Human Rights Watch has observed, the Samad-3’s ‘guidance and targeting capabilities are unclear, and the Houthi’s target was uncertain, making it difficult to determine whether the strike hit its intended target’.⁷⁵

On 9 December 2024, a Houthi drone hit a residential building in the town of Yavne in central Israel.⁷⁶ On 20 December, a Houthi drone damaged an elementary school, also in central Israel.⁷⁷ The following day, a missile hit a playground in a residential area in Tel Aviv, lightly injuring at least 16 civilians and causing some material damage.⁷⁸ As there was little sign that a military objective was being targeted, the strikes were indiscriminate and a serious violation of IHL.⁷⁹.

Disproportionate Israeli and US airstrikes against Yemen

On 20 July 2024, Israeli aircraft bombed locations in Hodeida, resulting in damage to the city’s main power station, shipping cranes, and gas and oil depots in the port. According to Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari, the Israeli military spokesman, alongside their civilian function, the sites were being used by the Houthis for weapons supply.⁸⁰ Human Rights Watch has, however, questioned the reliability of the claim, noting that inspectors from the UN Mission to Support the Hudaydah Agreement (UNMHA) had not seen any military presence in the port.⁸¹ That said, due to impediments imposed by the Houthis on the free movement of UNMHA inspectors,⁸² it cannot be excluded that port infrastructure was indeed used to transport weapons.

The fire triggered by the bombing, which lasted for several days, caused extensive material damage, raising concerns about the ability of the port – a major point of entry for humanitarian aid – to continue to function. The attack on the power station resulted in a twelve-hour cut to electricity. Human Rights Watch quoted a World Food Programme (WFP) official who claimed that WFP had lost 780,000 litres of fuel in the attack, which it was using to support hospital generators and water and sanitation infrastructure across Yemen.⁸³ NGO Mwatana for Human Rights similarly stressed the vital character of the infrastructure, noting that the port handled more than eighty per cent of Yemen’s entire humanitarian aid.⁸⁴

In a closed briefing at the UN Security Council, retired Major General Michael Beary, the head of UNMHA, called upon ‘all concerned’ to ‘avoid attacks that could harm civilians and damage civilian infrastructure’.⁸⁵ Human Rights Watch stressed the lack of any information in the public domain to underpin the claim of military use of the Hodeida power station and port infrastructure. It concluded that the attack was an ‘indiscriminate or disproportionate attack on civilians’ and possibly a war crime.⁸⁶ Indeed, in light of the significant and predictable humanitarian consequences that resulted, the attack appears to have been at the least disproportionate.⁸⁷

Further Israeli and US attacks on port infrastructure followed. On 29 September 2024, Israel again attacked Hodeida along with Ras Issa, another Red Sea port, as well as al-Hali and Ras Kathnib electrical-generating stations.⁸⁸ On 19 and 26 December 2024, repeated airstrikes were launched on ports and power stations in Al Hudaydah and Sana’a governorates, as well as Sana’a International Airport.⁸⁹ According to the UN Secretary-General, the airstrikes of 19 December 2024 caused considerable damage to the Red Sea ports’ infrastructure, leading to ‘the immediate and significant reduction in port capacity’.⁹⁰ The 26 December airstrike destroyed the airport’s air traffic control tower and damaged the runway while the Director-General of the World Health Organization, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, and the UN Resident Coordinator in Yemen, Julien Harneis, were awaiting their flight, on their way out of Yemen.⁹¹ The strikes also killed four civilians and injured twenty-one others.⁹² Further Israeli airstrikes against Red Sea port infrastructure took place on 10 January⁹³ and on 5 May 2025.⁹⁴

Further airstrikes on Sana’a International Airport on 5 May destroyed several civilian aircraft.⁹⁵ Israeli officials declared that the airport had been attacked because the Houthis had used it to smuggle weapons.⁹⁶ On 28 May, another airstrike destroyed the last remaining commercial passenger aircraft operating from the airport.⁹⁷ Mr Harneis said that the airport was ‘absolutely vital’ to the continuation of humanitarian aid for Yemen.⁹⁸ Human Rights Watch considered the strikes to be either indiscriminate or disproportionate.⁹⁹

In July 2025, the UN Secretary-General informed the UN Security Council that UNMHA’s patrols were able to witness the damage caused by the multiple airstrikes conducted by Israel and the United States.¹⁰⁰ He told the Council that the damage to port infrastructure had affected the flow of vital fuel, food, medicine and other basic goods through the ports’.¹⁰¹ This followed a report in The New York Times two months earlier that strikes against oil installations had triggered a fuel crisis in Yemen, driving up the price of food.¹⁰²

Israeli and US airstrikes against economic assets

On 5 May 2025, the Israeli Air Force bombed the Bajel cement factory in Hudaydah governorate.¹⁰³ Two reasons were given for selecting the plant as a target. First, the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) declared that the factory ‘functions as a significant economic resource for the Houthis’.¹⁰⁴ Second, the IDF claimed that the factory was ‘used for the construction of underground tunnels and terrorist infrastructure for the terrorist regime’.¹⁰⁵ The day that followed the attack on the Bajel cement factory, Israel bombed another cement factory in Sana’a governorate, seeking to justify it on the same basis.¹⁰⁶ Similarly, the objective of a deadly US bombing of the oil port of Ras Issa, on 17 April 2025, was ‘to degrade the economic source of power of the Houthis, who continue to exploit and bring great pain upon their fellow countrymen’.¹⁰⁷

As Human Rights Watch has remarked, a test that would accept making the port fuel depot a legitimate military objective ‘because it is an “economic source of power of the Houthis” or provides them revenue’ would render almost anything that offered economic benefit subject to military attack.¹⁰⁸ Concerning the second reason advanced by Israel, while cement or concrete produced in the factory can of course be used to build tunnels and other military infrastructure, the contribution to military action is indirect and remote. Thus, the attack appears to have been directed against a civilian object in violation of IHL.ICRC, Customary IHL Rule 7: ‘The Principle of Distinction between Civilian Objects and Military Objectives’.¹⁰⁹

Attacks against schools and medical facilities

The UN Panel of Experts noted that schools and places of worship were sometimes occupied, including in one case where a school served as a military base for the Houthis.¹¹⁰ Military use of schools (forty-six cases) and hospitals (eight cases) in 2024 was primarily by the Houthis (30 cases), followed by the Yemen Armed Forces and affiliated forces (24 cases).¹¹¹

Four attacks on schools and eleven on hospitals were also recorded by the UN, which attributed them to the Yemen Armed Forces (eight cases), the Houthis (four cases), AQAP (one case), and unidentified perpetrators (two cases).¹¹²

While the military use of schools for military purposes is not formally prohibited by IHL, it may violate the principle of precaution against the effects of attacks and related rules.¹¹³ The UN Secretary-General called on the Government of Yemen to implement the Safe Schools Declaration and avoid using schools for military purposes.¹¹⁴

Civilians under Attack

Under customary IHL, civilians enjoy general protection from the effects of hostilities, unless and for such time as they directly participate in hostilities.¹¹⁵ Accordingly, parties to armed conflicts must at all times distinguish between combatants and civilians, and are prohibited from directing attacks against civilians.¹¹⁶ In case of doubt, persons should be treated as civilians.¹¹⁷ Civilians may be incidentally affected by attacks against lawful targets. However, such attacks must not be disproportionate,¹¹⁸ and the attacker must take all feasible precautions to avoid or, in any event to minimize, incidental civilian impact.¹¹⁹

According to the Civilian Impact Monitoring Project (CIMP), 1,201 civilians were killed or injured by armed violence in 2024, with more than 200 children among the dead.¹²⁰ While noting that the figures were less than in 2023, the CIMP also remarked that more ‘mass casualty incidents’ were reported in 2024. Thus, in 2024, sixteen incidents involved at least ten civilian casualties, while in five, more than thirty civilian casualties were reported.¹²¹ CIMP attributes this trend to the resumption of airstrikes in Yemen.¹²²

In the first half of 2025, civilian casualties dramatically increased, especially between March and May. Between January and the end of June, 1,380 civilians were killed or injured in Yemen, an upward trend that continued in the months that followed.¹²³With 648 civilians killed or injured, April was ‘the fourth-highest civilian casualty total’ for a single month since CIMP began monitoring the situation in Yemen in 2018.¹²⁴ According to figures released by the Houthis, between October 2023 and 9 October 2025, Israeli and US airstrikes killed 319 civilians and wounded 1,357.¹²⁵ Relying on CIMP data, OCHA reported 970 civilian casualties between January and April 2025, of whom 667 had been killed or injured in airstrikes.¹²⁶

Civilian casualties from Israeli airstrikes

Israeli airstrikes on 20 July 2024 against several locations in Hodeida killed a reported six civilians and injured more than eighty others, in many cases inflicting severe burns on the victims.¹²⁷ Based on information from local media, The New York Times reported that, as a result of the airstrike of 29 September, at least four people were killed in Hodeida – a port worker and three engineers at the Al-Hali power station – and at least 33 people were injured. The information came from Al-Masirah, the Houthi-run television channel.¹²⁸ In a subsequent report, Airwars raised its calculation of civilian casualties to six killed and between forty-four and fifty-seven injured.¹²⁹ According to the UN Secretary-General, the airstrikes of 19 December 2024 killed nine civilians and wounded three others.¹³⁰ The unlawful attacks on the cement factories on 5 and 6 May killed up to ten civilians and injured up to another seventy-seven.¹³¹

Civilian casualties from US airstrikes

The resumption of US airstrikes in the second quarter of 2025 contributed materially to the dramatic increase in civilian casualties and damage to civilian infrastructure. On 27 April 2025, the US Department of Defense Central Command (CENTCOM) announced that it had struck more than 800 targets since 15 March 2025. CENTCOM said that the strikes had killed ‘hundreds of Houthi fighters and numerous Houthi leaders, including senior Houthi missile and UAV [aerial drone] officials’ and had been ‘executed using detailed and comprehensive intelligence ensuring lethal effects against the Houthis while minimizing risk to civilians’.¹³²

The UN Panel of Experts reported that Operation Rough Rider involved more than 1,000 coordinated strikes.¹³³ It quoted US government claims that the strikes resulted in ‘a major drop in ballistic missile launches and a decrease in the launching of one-way attack drones’.¹³⁴ Despite the public announcements, however, it was reported that, in private, US officials questioned the military effectiveness of the operations.¹³⁵

Although the US government occasionally communicated information about specific operations,¹³⁶ it did not usually disclose the results of its assessment of civilian casualties and damage to civilian infrastructure caused by US attacks.¹³⁷ On 17 March 2025, two days after the initiation of the operation, a US official explicitly denied there were ‘credible indications’ of ‘any civilian casualties’.¹³⁸ In contrast, Airwars identified four US attacks that had caused civilian casualties during only the first two days of the Operation – on 15 and 16 March 2025 – with a total potentially as high as forty-six civilians killed and thirty-seven injured.¹³⁹ On 16 March 2025, the Houthis claimed that the US attacks had already killed at least fifty-three civilians.¹⁴⁰

The Center for Civilians in Conflict (CIVIC) issued a statement expressing its concerns about reports of civilian casualties and damage to civilian infrastructure, especially in light of projected budget cuts in the US civilian harm mitigation and response programme.¹⁴¹ After the conclusion of the ceasefire, Airwars remarked that in a matter of weeks, President Trump’s administration had killed almost as many civilians as the previous twenty-three years of US military operations in Yemen.¹⁴² It also noted that during Operation Rough Rider, it documented more incidents with high numbers of casualties per strike than in any other US campaign.¹⁴³

The 17 April 2025 airstrikes against oil tankers in the port of Ras Issa triggered a fire that severely burned many. In total, the airstrikes killed at least eighty-four civilians, many of them port workers, but also three children. At least 150 other civilians were injured.¹⁴⁴ The airstrikes came in two waves, with the second launched after emergency services had arrived on the scene and which killed one first responder and injured another.¹⁴⁵ In addition to a manifest breach of the principle of distinction and precautions in attack, the second wave seemingly breached the duty to respect and protect medical personnel and medical units in all circumstances.¹⁴⁶ Human Rights Watch said the attack should be investigated as a possible war crime.¹⁴⁷

A US strike close to Sana’a on 28 April 2025 killed another eight civilians. No combatants were injured or killed and no military objects were destroyed as a result. It appears that the attack was the result of a targeting error. According to press reports, the location had been designated as a possible site for a Houthi weapons cache by an anonymous account on social media platform X. The account publishes information on Yemen based on open-source intelligence.¹⁴⁸ This raises serious concerns about compliance with the principles of distinction and precautions in attack, especially when it comes to the duty to verify that a target is indeed a military objective.¹⁴⁹

On 28 April 2025, a prison in the city of Sa’ada, which was being used as a detention centre for irregular migrants, mostly Ethiopians, was hit at least three times by US bombs.¹⁵⁰ Although the ICRC and the Yemen Red Crescent Society assisted the evacuation and provided medical care to the wounded,¹⁵¹ the humanitarian response was insufficient, in part as a result of the United Nations having suspended its activities in the governorate on 10 February.¹⁵² According to the Houthis, the attack killed sixty-eight civilians and wounded forty-seven others.¹⁵³ Airwars corroborated these figures.¹⁵⁴

The US Department of Defense announced that it was conducting a damage assessment.¹⁵⁵ As of the time of writing, no information about this planned assessment – including whether it has been done – has been made publicly available. While the Houthis are said to have sometimes recruited African migrants, including by force,¹⁵⁶ there is no indication that this had been the case in this location at the time of the attack. Survivors interviewed by The New York Times and Amnesty International affirmed that no Houthi fighters were present in the facility.¹⁵⁷ It therefore appears that the attack was directed at a civilian object and a serious violation of the principle of distinction.¹⁵⁸ The United States failed to do everything feasible to verify that the intended target was a military objective.¹⁵⁹

Houthi attacks on civilians in the NIAC with the IRG and affiliated forces

Intermittent confrontations between Houthi and IRG and affiliated forces caused civilian casualties particularly in villages on the frontlines.¹⁶⁰ Because ceasefire violations ‘were predominantly the result of small-arms fire’ and were only ‘occasionally supported by heavier-calibre weapons’,¹⁶¹ few mass-casualty incidents seem to have occurred. On 1 December 2024, however, Houthi shelling of a marketplace in Taiz governorate is reported to have killed several civilians and wounded eight.¹⁶²

According to the UN Panel of Experts, between 1 January and 22 July 2025, the Houthis targeted civilians and civilian objects on 35 occasions, killing eight civilians and wounding twenty-nine others, as well as destroying civilian property.¹⁶³ Between 5 and 12 January, for instance, the Houthis raided a village and attacked homes and other civilian objects, killing nineteen civilians and injuring fifteen others.¹⁶⁴ These are prima facie war crimes.¹⁶⁵

Denial of humanitarian access and attacks against humanitarian workers

In 2024, the UN recorded numerous incidents of denial of humanitarian access and threats or attacks against humanitarian workers, most (52 cases) attributed to unidentified perpetrators; with three attributed to the Houthis.¹⁶⁶ Human Rights Watch reported that all parties had denied access to humanitarian workers, and that obstructionism by the Houthi authorities in particular, taking the form of unjustified bureaucratic requirements, had a worsening effect on the spread of a cholera outbreak.¹⁶⁷ In government-controlled areas, power struggles between different factions and agencies affiliated with the central government have also reportedly resulted in obstruction of access for humanitarian agencies.¹⁶⁸

On 3 August 2024, the Houthis raided the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) in Sana’a, confiscating property and documents.¹⁶⁹ According to the UN Secretary-General, humanitarian access denial, in the form of arbitrary detention of UN personnel and movement restrictions on female staff of UN entities and international NGOs, resulted in limitations in the provision of life-saving services, including healthcare for victims of sexual violence.¹⁷⁰

Protection of Persons in the Power of the Enemy

Under customary IHL, special protection is afforded to ‘protected persons’, including several categories of civilians who face a specific risk of harm, such as women, children, refugees, and IDPs.¹⁷¹ IHL provides certain fundamental guarantees for anyone who is in the power of a party to a conflict, prohibiting torture, other inhumane or degrading treatment, all forms of sexual violence, enforced disappearance, and unfair trials.

Arbitrary deprivation of liberty and enforced disappearance

According to Human Rights Watch and Mwatana for Human Rights, most actors in Yemen, including the Houthis, governmental authorities, and affiliated forces, have perpetrated enforced disappearances and arbitrarily detained civilians.¹⁷² Imprisonment was sometimes accompanied by torture or other ill-treatment.¹⁷³ In a report issued in August 2025, Mwatana for Human Rights stated that enforced disappearance had become ‘a persistent pattern in the conduct of all parties to the Yemeni conflict’, affirming that the violations ‘went beyond isolated incidents to become a deliberate and generalized policy through which public life was managed by the logic of force, with each authority acting as an independent entity imposing laws and carrying out judgments without any legal accountability’.¹⁷⁴ This indicates the possible commission of crimes against humanity as well as war crimes.

Arbitrary detention and enforced disappearance of perceived political opponents were widespread and/or systematic in both Houthi- and STC-controlled areas.¹⁷⁵ In October 2024, an official from the Ministry of Education who had been abducted by the Houthis in June died in custody, allegedly as a result of the torture inflicted on him.¹⁷⁶ In areas under Houthi control, civilians were sometimes coerced into confessing they had spied for Israel or the United States.¹⁷⁷ The Houthis have held detainees incommunicado for long periods of time and have failed to provide information to relatives as to the fate of detained persons,¹⁷⁸ turning such arrests into enforced disappearance, a war crime under customary IHL.¹⁷⁹ Fair-trial guarantees were not complied with, with victims denied legal counsel and access to evidence,¹⁸⁰ in breach of fundamental IHL guarantees.¹⁸¹

Arbitrary detention of humanitarian workers by the Houthis continued during the reporting period. Repeated calls were made for the immediate and unconditional release of all humanitarian workers unlawfully held in custody, including thirteen UN humanitarian workers abducted in June 2024, but with little effect. The overwhelming majority of those in custody were being held in unknown locations.¹⁸² From 17 July 2024 onwards, Houthi authorities imposed the obligation that their approval be obtained before international organizations recruited staff.¹⁸³

Another eight UN staff members were abducted between 23 and 25 January 2025, resulting in a pause in all UN activities in Sa’ada governorate on 10 February 2025.¹⁸⁴ That day, a WFP staff member who had been abducted and held incommunicado died while in captivity.¹⁸⁵ According to the National Commission to Investigate Alleged Violations to Human Rights, he was tortured to death.¹⁸⁶ Mwatana for Human Rights note the direct causal link between enforced disappearance and arbitrary detention of humanitarian workers and the deteriorating humanitarian situation in Yemen.¹⁸⁷

Child recruitment and use in hostilities

According to an October 2025 report by the Yemeni Coalition for Monitoring Human Rights Violations, girls and children with disabilities are especially impacted.¹⁸⁸ The authors noted that violations in areas controlled by the Houthis ‘have taken on a systematic and institutionalized character’ in particular because of the widespread practice of child recruitment.¹⁸⁹

In 2024, the UN verified 182 cases of recruitment of children in Yemen, most by the Houthis (85 cases), followed by the Yemen Armed Forces (23) and affiliated armed forces and groups (74). Reportedly, children served in combat roles in fifty-nine cases.¹⁹⁰ The Houthis reportedly recruited children as young as seven years old.¹⁹¹ This is a war crime under customary IHL.¹⁹² The National Commission to Investigate Alleged Violations to Human Rights reported that a 15 year-old boy recruited by the Houthis was killed in combat in January 2025.¹⁹³

Forced recruitment of girls into the female security wing of the Houthis (the ‘Zaynabiyat’) increased during the reporting period.¹⁹⁴ The UN Panel of Experts thus reported that girls had been trained by the Houthis ‘to search homes, disperse crowds and use small arms’.¹⁹⁵ In 2024, two boys were reportedly abducted by the armed forces and groups affiliated with the Yemen Armed Forces.¹⁹⁶ Yemen is a State Party to the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict, which prohibits all compulsory recruitment of children under 18 years of age and requires each State Party to take all feasible measures to ensure that members of its armed forces under 18 years of age do not take a direct part in hostilities.¹⁹⁷

Conflict-related sexual and gender-based violence

The UN Secretary-General has reported that in 2024, women and girls in Yemen continued to be ‘exposed to heightened risks of conflict-related sexual violence which, due to harmful social norms, the fear of reprisals and stigma, remained dramatically underreported’.¹⁹⁸ Eleven cases of sexual violence (against six boys and five girls) were verified by the UN.¹⁹⁹ In some cases, torture of those detained by the Houthis involved sexual violence or the threat thereof, including cases of rape of men or boys.²⁰⁰ The Panel of Experts recounts the testimony of a woman detainee who witnessed twenty-five cases of rape through a hole in the wall of her cell.²⁰¹

There were also reports of acts of sexual violence against children, including rape, in ‘summer camps’ where the Houthis indoctrinate children,²⁰² as well as sexual exploitation of girls recruited into the Zaynabiyat.²⁰³ The UN Secretary-General also reported that forced marriage of children was ‘incentivized to secure loyalty to the Houthis’ cause’.²⁰⁴

Murder and torture of journalists

Recurrent violations against journalists were reported, including their arbitrary arrest and detention, enforced disappearance, torture, ill-treatment, and murder. These crimes occurred in government-controlled, STC-controlled, and Houthi-controlled areas.²⁰⁵ On 28 December 2024, AQAP reportedly executed journalist Mohammed Qaed Al-Maqri, who had been abducted in 2015 due to his press coverage of anti-AQAP protests.²⁰⁶

The extent to which these acts were motivated by the journalists’ reporting on the armed conflicts in Yemen is not always evident from the limited information publicly available. Moreover, reasons for the deprivation of liberty are not always communicated to the victims.For instance, the abduction of journalist and writer Mohammed Dabwan Al-Meyahi was reportedly ‘due to his criticisms of behaviour by the Houthi militia on his official Facebook account and in broadcasts and articles’.²⁰⁷ What is certain is that numerous violations of the freedom of the press have created a climate where reporting on the armed conflict has become dangerous due to fear of reprisals, at least in Houthi-controlled areas.

The UN Panel of Experts has observed that: ‘The ideology of the Houthis is spread through systematic propaganda. Houthi control of the media and Internet access prevent the people from gaining access to impartial information’.²⁰⁸ Human Rights Watch also reported that ‘the Houthis have threatened and reportedly arrested people from areas hit by US strikes for speaking to the media or nongovernmental organizations’.²⁰⁹ The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) reported that: ‘It has proven nearly impossible for Yemeni journalists to report on the aftermath of recent Israeli and US attacks due to Houthi authorities’ strict censorship’.²¹⁰ Parties to the conflict appear to be using repression of free speech and propaganda as a tool for consolidating their power over the areas and people they control.²¹¹

1
Center for Preventive Action, ‘Conflict in Yemen and the Red Sea’, Updated 12 November 2025.
2
Amnesty International, The State of the World’s Human Rights, London, April 2025, p 400; Civilian Impact Monitoring Project,‘2024 Annual Report: 1 January–31 December 2024’, Protection Cluster Yemen, January 2025, p 4.
3
‘Grundberg: Escalating Tensions in the Region Hinder Yemen Peace Process’, Yemen Monitor, 1 October 2024; Republic of Yemen National Commission to Investigate Alleged Violations to Human Rights (NCIAVHR), ‘Thirteenth Periodic Report on the Work of the National Commission to Investigate Alleged Violations to Human Rights from August 1, 2024 to July 31, 2025’, Report, 4 September 2025, p 7.
4
ICRC, ‘Middle East: De-Escalation and Protection of Civilians Urgently Needed’, Press release, 30 July 2024.
5
S. Almosawa, ‘Yemen’s Houthis Renew Blockade on Israeli Ships as Deadline Expires for Gaza Aid’, Drop Site, 12 March 2025; ‘“Impact de missile” près de l’aéroport de Tel-Aviv après un tir du Yémen’, Radio Télévision Suisse, 4 May 2025.
6
D. Sabbagh, ‘US announces naval coalition to defend Red Sea shipping from Houthi attacks’, The Guardian, 19 December 2023; F. Al-Goidi, ‘Yemen’s Quagmire: Why Isn’t U.S. Might Winning?’, Middle East Council on Global Affairs, Policy Note, 27 July 2025.
7
Final Report of the Panel of Experts on Yemen established pursuant to Security Council resolution 2140 (2014), UN Doc S/2025/650, 17 October 2025, (hereafter, Final Report of the UN Panel of Experts on Yemen), para 43. See also J. Ismay, ‘U.S. Stealth Bombers Attack Houthi Weapons Caches in Yemen’, The New York Times, 17 October 2024; A. Rasgon, ‘U.S. Strikes Militant Group in Yemen That Has Kept Up Attacks on Ships’, The New York Times, 31 December 2024.
8
S. Almosawa, ‘With Massive Airstrikes on Yemen, Trump Intensifies Undeclared War Against the Poorest Country in the Arab World’, Drop Site, 16 March 2025; Z. Kanno-Youngs and V. Nereim, ‘Trump Says the U.S. Will Cease Strikes on Houthi Militants’, The New York Times, 6 May 2025; Final Report of the UN Panel of Experts on Yemen, UN Doc S/2025/650, para 21.
9
R. De Silva and R. Geitner, ‘What the Chats Signal about Trump’s Bombing Campaign in Yemen’, Airwars, 3 April 2025.
10
Final Report of the UN Panel of Experts on Yemen, UN Doc S/2025/650, para 48.
11
Ibid, para 41; J. Ismay, ‘Houthi Drones Could Become Stealthier and Fly Farther’, The New York Times, 13 March 2025.
12
Final Report of the UN Panel of Experts on Yemen, UN Doc S/2025/650, para 41.
13
‘Saudi Arabia backs Yemen’s government, urges separatists to withdraw from seized provinces’, France 24, 27 December 2025.
14
‘Yemen’s government says southern areas retaken from secessionist STC forces’, Al Jazeera, 10 January 2026.
15
Mwatana for Human Rights, ‘Bloody Gambles: Human Rights Situation in Yemen 2024’, Annual Report, Sana’a, August 2025, pp 31–35.
16
Final Report of the UN Panel of Experts on Yemen, UN Doc S/2025/650, para 24.
17
Oxfam, ‘Yemen Faces Economic Freefall and Devastating Aid Crisis after a Decade of Conflict’, Press release, 26 March 2025.
18
OCHA, ‘Yemen Humanitarian Needs and Response Plan 2025’, January 2025.
19
IPC, ‘IPC Global Initiative – Special Brief – Yemen’, 27 June 2025, p 1. IPC Phase 3 is a situation of crisis where households either have food consumption gaps reflected by ‘high or above-usual acute malnutrition’ or ‘are marginally able to meet minimum food needs but only by depleting essential livelihood assets or through crisis-coping strategies’. IPC Phase 4 is where households either have large food consumption gaps reflected in ‘very high acute malnutrition and excess mortality’ or can mitigate those gaps but only by employing ‘emergency livelihood strategies and asset liquidation’. IPC, ‘Factsheet: The IPC Famine’, October 2024, p 2.
20
IPC, ‘IPC Global Initiative – Special Brief – Yemen’, 27 June 2025, p 2.
21
‘Yemen: One in Two Children Severely Malnourished after 10 Years of War’, UN News, 25 March 2025.
22
IPC, ‘IPC Global Initiative – Special Brief – Yemen’, 27 June 2025, pp 3–4.
23
Ibid, p 3.
24
NCIAVHR, ‘Thirteenth Periodic Report on the Work of the National Commission to Investigate Alleged Violations to Human Rights from August 1, 2024 to July 31, 2025’, p 6; V. Nereim and S. Almosawa, ‘Israeli Strike on Yemeni Port Will Harm Civilians, Not Houthis, Experts Say’, The New York Times, 21 July 2024.
25
M. A. Kalfood, ‘What Trump’s “Cruel” Halt to Foreign Aid Means for Yemen’, DAWN, 14 February 2025; Amnesty International, ‘Yemen: US Abrupt and Irresponsible Aid Cuts Compound Human Rights Crisis and Put Millions at Risk’, Press release, 10 April 2025; Médecins Sans Frontières, ‘After First 100 Days of US Aid Budget Cuts’, Press release, 25 April 2025.
26
OCHA, ‘Yemen: Addendum to the 2025 Humanitarian Needs and Response Plan (HNRP): Urgent Funding Requirements’, May 2025, p 1.
27
Ibid, p 3. See also the call issued in May 2025 by humanitarian agencies and NGOs: Center for Civilians in Conflict, ‘CIVIC Joins Over 100 Organisations to Prevent Catastrophe in Yemen’, Press release, 20 May 2025.
28
Despite the fact that the Joint Forces on the West Coast maintain a certain of autonomy, they are considered State organs owing to their official affiliation to the IRG.
29
Protocol Additional to the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949, and relating to the Protection of Victims of Non-International Armed Conflicts; adopted at Geneva, 8 June 1977; entered into force, 7 December 1978.
30
A. Mohammed and S. Yan, ‘Houthis team up with feared Al-Qaeda branch in new threat to Yemen,’ The Daily Telegraph, 4 May 2024.
31
Center for Preventive Action, ‘Conflict in Yemen and the Red Sea’, Updated 12 November 2025.
32
See eg ‘Leader of Revolution: We Seek to Enhance Military Operations in Indian Ocean Mediterranean Sea’, SabaNet – Yemen News Agency, 18 July 2024; ‘Excerpts of Sayyid Leader Speech about Latest Developments 13 Safar 1447 AH’, SabaNet – Yemen News Agency, 7 August 2025.
33
ICTY, Prosecutor v Kunarac, Appeal Judgment (Case Nos IT-96-23 and IT-96-23/1-A), 12 June 2002, paras 58–9.
34
Sana’a Center for Strategic Studies, ‘Yemen Zones of Control (April 1 – June 30, 2025)’, July 2025.
35
IPC, Yemen (GoY Controlled Areas) (Partial Analysis) – May 2025–February 2026, Rome, 18 July 2025, p 3.
36
UN Security Council Resolution 2786, adopted by unanimous vote in favour on 14 July 2025, fourth preambular para
37
‘Arab League Condemns Iran for Handing Yemen Embassy to Houthis’, Arab News, 21 November 2019.
38
ICRC, Commentary on the Third Geneva Convention: Treatment of Prisoners of War, Vol 1, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2021, para 267.
39
Aguilar-Amory and Royal Bank of Canada claims – Tinoco Arbitration (Great Britain v Costa Rica), Reports of International Arbitral Awards, Vol 1 (1923), p 381.
40
ICRC, Commentary on the Third Geneva Convention: Treatment of Prisoners of War, para 268.
41
H. Lauterpacht, ‘Recognition of Governments: I’, Columbia Law Review, Vol 45, No 6 (1945), 821–25.
42
‘A lightning advance by separatists has reshaped Yemen’s civil war’, The Economist, 30 December 2025.
43
S. Al-Atrush, ‘Saudi Arabia strikes UAE weapons in Yemen as rift deepens’, The Times, 31 December 2025.
44
A. al-Haj and F. Khaled, ‘Saudi-backed forces regain control of Yemen’s Hadramout from UAE-backed separatists’, The Times of Israel, 4 January 2026; .‘Yemen’s Saudi-backed government retakes southern areas from STC: What next?’, Al Jazeera, 12 January 2026.
45
See R. Mohsen, ‘Yemeni journalists caught between Israeli airstrikes and authoritarian crackdown’, Index on Censorship, 3 October 2025.
46
Human Rights Watch, ‘Yemen: Events of 2024’, World Report 2025, p 538.
47
‘Impact of arms transfers on human rights: Report of the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights’, UN Doc A/HRC/58/41, 9 January 2025, paras 22–24.
48
L. Castellanos-Jankiewicz, J. Bunnik, A. Gobillon, J. Li, J. Melck, and Z. Wendt, Transparency in European Arms Exports: Access to Information and Accountability, University of Amsterdam/Asser Institute/European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights (ECCHR), June 2025, pp 23–29.
49
Disclose, ‘Armes françaises utilisées au Yémen: la justice administrative verrouille tout accès à l’information’, 22 July 2024; ECCHR, ‘Challenging Organised Opacity: Administrative Court Blocks All Access to Information about French Arms Sales to Yemen’, Press release, 23 July 2024; Amnesty International, ‘Ventes d’armes françaises à la coalition militaire engagée au Yémen: la justice administrative verrouille tout accès à l’information’, Press release, 19 July 2024.
50
European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights, ‘Bombed in Air War, Stalled by Redacted Files: How German Authorities Have Failed Yemeni Plaintiffs’, 19 March 2025.
51
Amnesty International, The State of the World’s Human Rights, pp 180–81.
52
ICRC, Customary IHL Rule 7: ‘The Principle of Distinction between Civilian Objects and Military Objectives’.
53
ICRC, Customary IHL Rule 9: ‘Definition of Civilian Objects’.
54
ICRC, Customary IHL Rule 10: ‘Civilian Objects’ Loss of Protection from Attack’.
55
ICRC, Customary IHL Rule 8: ‘Definition of Military Objectives’. In addition, the object’s partial or total destruction, capture, or neutralisation must offer a definite military advantage in the prevailing circumstances.
56
‘Protection of Civilians in Armed Conflict: Report of the Secretary-General’, UN Doc S/2025/271, 15 May 2025, para 9.
57
Ibid, para 10.
58
Ibid, para 22.
59
Amnesty International, The State of the World’s Human Rights, p 400.
60
Final Report of the UN Panel of Experts on Yemen, UN Doc S/2025/650, paras 11, 64 and 68.
61
‘Revolution Leader: Any Practical Measures or Steps in Confronting Saudi Aggression Are in Battle Context to Support Gaza’, SabaNet, 11 July 2024; ‘Revolution Leader: Our Naval Operations Have Achieved Significant Results in Disrupting Umm al-Rashrash Port and Inflicting Major Losses on Israeli Enemy’, SabaNet, 2 October 2025.
62
San Remo Manual on International Law Applicable to Armed Conflicts at Sea, International Institute of International Humanitarian Law, para 67.
63
Ibid, paras 93–104.
64
See eg: A. Clapham, War, Oxford University Press, 2021, pp 365–66; W. Heintschel von Heinegg, ‘Methods and Means of Naval Warfare in Non-International Armed Conflict’, International Law Studies, Vol 88 (2012), 212–13; N. Ronzitti, ‘Le droit humanitaire applicable aux conflits armés en mer’, Recueil des cours de l’Académie de droit international de La Haye, Vol 242 (1993-V) 158–59.
65
M. Frostad, ‘Naval Blockade’, Arctic Review on Law and Politics, Vol 9 (2018), 199.
66
See eg the cases mentioned in ‘July 15 U.S. Central Command Update’, Press release, US Central Command, 15 July 2024.
67
Final Report of the UN Panel of Experts on Yemen, UN Doc S/2025/650, para 68.
68
‘Protection of Civilians in Armed Conflict: Report of the Secretary-General’, UN Doc S/2025/271, para 22; ‘Large Oil Slick off Yemen after Houthi Attack on Liberian Crude Tanker’, The Arab Weekly, 18 July 2024.
69
L. Chutel, ‘Here’s What We Know About the Oil Tanker Stuck in the Red Sea’, The New York Times, 29 August 2024; and ‘Burning Oil Tanker in Red Sea Is Towed to Safety’, The New York Times, 17 September 2024; European External Action Service, ‘MV Sounion Tanker Safe Following Attack in the Red Sea’, 26 September 2024.
70
ICRC, Customary IHL Rule 7: ‘The Principle of Distinction between Civilian Objects and Military Objectives’.
71
ICRC, Customary IHL Rule 44: ‘Due Regard for the Natural Environment in Military Operations’.
72
Final Report of the UN Panel of Experts on Yemen, UN Doc S/2025/650, para 17. See also Amnesty International, The State of the World’s Human Rights, p 401.
73
According to Israeli sources cited by the Panel, of the 101 ballistic missiles fired between September 2024 and 7 July 2025, ‘57 were intercepted and 38 failed’. Final Report of the UN Panel of Experts on Yemen, UN Doc S/2025/650, para 51. See also G. Sobelman and M. M. Bigg, ‘Israel Intercepts Missile Fired From Yemen as Conflict With Houthis Continues’, The New York Times, 21 July 2024.
74
See, reporting one killed and four wounded civilians: Amnesty International, The State of the World’s Human Rights, p 401; citing one civilian death and eight wounded, G. Sobelman, A. Boxerman, R. Bergman, L. Jakes, E. Mendell, ‘Houthis Launch Deadly Drone Strike on Tel Aviv, Evading Israel’s Defenses’, The New York Times, 19 July 2024.
75
Human Rights Watch, ‘Yemen: Israeli Port Attack Possible War Crime’, Press release, 19 August 2024.
76
‘Houthis Claim Attack on Central Israel in Response to Gaza “Massacres”’, Al Jazeera, 9 December 2024.
77
‘Pointing to “Escalatory Turn” in Israeli-Houthi Conflict, Top Political, Peacebuilding Official Urges Action to Reverse Dangerous Trajectory, Briefing Security Council’, UN News, 30 December 2024.
78
J. Yoon and A. Boxerman, ‘Houthi Missile Strikes Tel Aviv as Attacks Increase’, The New York Times, 21 December 2024; Final Report of the UN Panel of Experts on Yemen, UN Doc S/2025/650, para 53.
79
ICRC, Customary IHL Rule 11: ‘Indiscriminate Attacks’
80
A. Boxerman, R. Bergman, S. Almosawa, and E. Schmitt, ‘Israeli Jets Bomb Sites in Yemen Linked to Iran-Backed Houthis’, The New York Times, 20 July 2024.
81
Human Rights Watch, ‘Yemen: Israeli Port Attack Possible War Crime’.
82
UN Security Council Resolution 2742, adopted on 8 July 2024, fourth preambular para See also Letter dated 11 June 2024 from the UN Secretary-General to the President of the Security Council, UN Doc S/2024/460, 12 June 2024, p 3; and Letter dated 10 June 2025, UN Doc S/2025/371, 11 June 2025, p 4.
83
Human Rights Watch, ‘Yemen: Israeli Port Attack Possible War Crime’.
84
Mwatana for Human Rights, ‘Mwatana Calls for International Investigation into Israeli Attacks on Hodeidah’, Press release, 22 July 2024.
85
UNMHA, ‘UNMHA’s Head of Mission Briefs the Security Council’, Press release, 24 July 2024.
86
Human Rights Watch, ‘Yemen: Israeli Port Attack Possible War Crime’.
87
ICRC, Customary IHL Rule 14: ‘Proportionality in Attack’.
88
Amnesty International, The State of the World’s Human Rights, p 401; ‘Israeli Army Launches Air Raids on Yemen’s Ras Isa and Hodeidah’, Al Jazeera, 29 September 2024.
89
M. M. Bigg, ‘Israel Launches Airstrikes Against Houthis in Yemen as Netanyahu Issues Warning’, The New York Times, 19 December 2024; Amnesty International, The State of the World’s Human Rights, p 401.
90
United Nations, ‘Secretary-General Gravely Concerned by Reports of Israeli Air Strikes on Yemen’, Press Release, 19 December 2024.
91
S. Almosawa, ‘Israel Vows to Assassinate Houthi Leaders Amid Intensifying Airstrikes in Yemen’, Drop Site, 27 December 2024.
92
I. Kershner and I. Naar, ‘Israel Bombs Yemeni Airport and Ports After Houthi Missile Launches’, The New York Times, 26 December 2024; ‘Israel Strikes Yemen’s Sanaa Airport, Hodeidah Power Plant’, Al Jazeera, 26 December 2024.
93
A. Boxerman and I. Naar, ‘Israel Strikes Houthi-Controlled Ports and a Power Plant in Yemen’, The New York Times, 10 January 2025.
94
A. Boxerman and S. Almosawa, ‘Israel Bombs Yemen After Houthi Missile Struck Near Tel Aviv Airport’, The New York Times, 5 May 2025.
95
Ibid; A. Boxerman and V. Nereim, ‘Israel Bombs Yemen’s Main Airport in Retaliation for Houthi Strike’, The New York Times, 6 May 2025; Final Report of the UN Panel of Experts on Yemen, UN Doc S/2025/650, para 16; NCIAVHR, ‘Thirteenth Periodic Report on the Work of the National Commission to Investigate Alleged Violations to Human Rights from August 1, 2024 to July 31, 2025’, p 60.
96
Human Rights Watch, ‘Israel, Yemen: Investigate Airport Attacks as War Crimes’, Press release, 3 June 2025.
97
Final Report of the UN Panel of Experts on Yemen, UN Doc S/2025/650, para 16.
98
Human Rights Watch, ‘Israel, Yemen: Investigate Airport Attacks as War Crimes’.
99
Ibid.
100
See also UNMHA, ‘Safeguarding Lifelines: UNMHA’s Work in Hudaydah Ports’, 3 September 2025.
101
Ibid.
102
I. Naar and S. Al-Batati, ‘When the U.S. and Israel Bomb the Houthis, Civilians Pay the Highest Price’, The New York Times, 21 May 2025.
103
‘ISYEM250505c – May 5, 2025’, Airwars, 14 July 2025.
104
IDF statement in Telegram post quoted in ‘ISYEM250505c – May 5, 2025’, Airwars, 14 July 2025.
105
Ibid.
106
‘ISYEM250506a – May 6, 2025’, 21 July 2025.
107
US Central Command, ‘Destruction of Houthi Controlled Ras Isa Fuel Port’, 17 April 2025.
108
Human Rights Watch, ‘Yemen: US Strikes on Port an Apparent War Crime’, 4 June 2025.
109
See similarly NCIAVHR, ‘Thirteenth Periodic Report on the Work of the National Commission to Investigate Alleged Violations to Human Rights from August 1, 2024 to July 31, 2025’, p 62.
110
Final Report of the UN Panel of Experts on Yemen, UN Doc S/2025/650, para 128.
111
‘Children and Armed Conflict: Report of the Secretary-General’, UN Doc A/79/878–S/2025/247, 17 June 2025, para 233.
112
Ibid.
113
ICRC, Customary IHL Rule 22, ‘Principle of Precautions against the Effects of Attacks’; Rule 23: ‘Location of Military Objectives outside Densely Populated Areas’; and Rule 24: ‘Removal of Civilians and Civilian Objects from the Vicinity of Military Objectives’.
114
‘Children and Armed Conflict: Report of the Secretary-General’, UN Doc A/79/878–S/2025/247, para 236.
115
ICRC, Customary IHL Rule 6: ‘Civilians’ Loss of Protection from Attack’.
116
ICRC, Customary IHL Rule 1: ‘The Principle of Distinction between Civilians and Combatants’.
117
ICRC, Customary IHL Rule 6: ‘Civilians’ Loss of Protection from Attack’. The accompanying commentary states that in NIACs, ‘the issue of doubt has hardly been addressed in State practice, even though a clear rule on this subject would be desirable as it would enhance the protection of the civilian population against attack.’ One ‘cannot automatically attack anyone who might appear dubious….’ The same approach with respect to IACs ‘seems justified’ in NIACs.
118
ICRC, Customary IHL Rule 14: ‘Proportionality in Attack’.
119
ICRC, Customary IHL Rule 15: ‘Principle of Precautions in Attack’.
120
CIMP, ‘2024 Annual Report: 1 January–31 December 2024’, Report, Protection Cluster Yemen, January 2025, p 2.
121
CIMP,‘2024 Annual Report: 1 January–31 December 2024’, p 2.
122
Ibid.
123
See the CIMP Monthly Reports Archive.
124
CIMP, ‘CIMP Monthly Report – April 2025’.
125
‘1,676 Martyrs, Wounded since Yemeni People Supported Gaza Strip: Report’, SabaNet, 8 October 2025.
126
OCHA, ‘Yemen: Addendum to the 2025 HNRP’, p 1.
127
G. Sobelman and M. M. Bigg, ‘Israel Intercepts Missile Fired From Yemen as Conflict With Houthis Continues’, The New York Times, 21 July 2024; Amnesty International, The State of the World’s Human Rights, p 401; ‘ISYEM240720a – July 20, 2024’, Airwars, 15 July 2025.
128
C. Maag, E. Ward, and A. Rasgon, ‘Israel Strikes Multiple Fronts, Including Long-Distance Attack on Yemen’, The New York Times, 29 September 2024. See also Amnesty International, The State of the World’s Human Rights, p 401.
129
‘ISYEM240929a – September 29, 2024’, Airwars, 15 July 2025.
130
UN, ‘Secretary-General Gravely Concerned by Reports of Israeli Air Strikes on Yemen’, Press Release, 19 December 2024.
131
‘ISYEM250505c – May 5, 2025’, Airwars, 14 July 2025; ‘ISYEM250506a – May 6, 2025’, Airwars, 21 July 2025.
132
US Centcom, ‘USCENTCOM Forces Continue to Target Houthi Terrorists’, 27 April 2025. See also E. Wong, ‘U.S. Military Says Its Air Campaign Has Hit More Than 800 Targets in Yemen’, The New York Times, 28 April 2025.
133
Final Report of the UN Panel of Experts on Yemen, UN Doc S/2025/650, para 20.
134
Ibid, para 44.
135
See eg: P. Eavis and I. Naar, ‘Signal Leak Bared U.S. Aims in Yemen. But Defeating Houthis Won’t Be Easy.’, The New York Times, 27 March 2025; E. Schmitt, E. Wong, and J. Ismay, ‘U.S. Strikes in Yemen Burning Through Munitions With Limited Success’ The New York Times, 4 April 2025.
136
See eg: ‘CENTCOM Forces Defeat Houthi Attacks on U.S. Navy and U.S.-Flagged Ships in Gulf of Aden’, News release, US Centcom, 1 December 2024.
137
See eg: C. T. Lopez, ‘Centcom Conducts Strikes in Yemen, Syria’, US Department of Defense, 12 November 2024; ‘CENTCOM Conducts Precision Airstrike Against Iran-Backed Houthi Facility in Yemen’, US Central Command, 16 December 2024; ‘CENTCOM Conducts Airstrikes Against Iran-Backed Houthi Missile Storage and Command/Control’, US Central Command, 21 December 2024; ‘CENTCOM Forces Strike Multiple Houthi Targets in Yemen’, US Central Command, 31 December 2024; ‘CENTCOM Forces Strike Houthi Advanced Conventional Weapon Storage Facilities in Yemen’, US Central Command, 8 January 2025. See also E. Schmitt, ‘U.S. Military Provides Few Details on Daily Strikes in Yemen’, The New York Times, 26 March 2025.
138
‘Chief Pentagon Spokesman Sean Parnell Holds Press Briefing’, news release, US Department of Defense, 17 March 2025.
139
Airwars reports: ‘USYEM250315b – March 15, 2025’, 29 April 2025; ‘USYEM250315a – March 15, 2025’, 29 April 2025; ‘USYEM250316b – March 16, 2025’, 26 March 2025; and ‘USYEM250316a – March 16, 2025’, 26 March 2025.
140
I. Naar and S. Al-Batati, ‘Houthis Vow Retaliation Against U.S., Saying Yemen Strikes Killed at Least 53’, The New York Times, 16 March 2025. See also ‘US Strikes on Yemen Oil Terminal Kill at Least 58, Houthis Say’, BBC, 19 April 2025.
141
‘CIVIC Statement on Reports of Civilian Casualties in US Airstrikes in Yemen’, Center for Civilians in Conflict, 22 April 2025.
142
R. De Silva, R. Geitner, and A. Zahn, ‘Trump Nearly Doubled U.S. Civilian Casualty Toll in Yemen’, Airwars, 18 June 2025.
143
Ibid.
144
‘USYEM250417a – April 17, 2025’, Airwars, 17 June 2025.
145
Ibid.
146
ICRC, Customary IHL Rule 25: ‘Medical Personnel’; and Rule 28: ‘Medical Units’.
147
Human Rights Watch, ‘Yemen: US Strikes on Port an Apparent War Crime’.
148
‘Houthi-basis, of toch iets anders? Onderzoekers open bronnen worstelen ermee’, Nederlandse Omroep Stichting (NOS), 3 May 2025; R. Grim and M. Hussain, ‘Pentagon May Have Drawn on Anonymous Social Media Accounts in Planning Deadly Yemen Attack’, Drop Site, 1 May 2025.
149
ICRC, Customary IHL Rule 16: ‘Target Verification’.
150
S. Almosawa, ‘U.S.-Made Bomb Fragments Identified at Strike on a Migrant Facility in Yemen That Killed Nearly 70’, Drop Site, 1 May 2025; A. Lajka, A. Toler, C. Kim and A. Byrd, ‘Video: Visual Analysis Shows U.S. Likely Bombed Yemen Migrant Detention Center’, The New York Times, 3 May 2025.
151
ICRC, ‘Yemen/ ICRC Responds to Deadly Attack on Sa’ada Prison/ Urges for Protection of Civilians amidst Worsening Humanitarian Crisis’, Press release, 28 April 2025.
152
Almosawa, ‘U.S.-Made Bomb Fragments Identified at Strike on a Migrant Facility in Yemen That Killed Nearly 70’.
153
‘USYEM250428a – April 28, 2025’, Airwars, 6 November 2025.
154
P. Wintour and J. Burke, ‘Houthi Rebels Say US Airstrike on Detention Centre Killed Dozens of African Migrants’, The Guardian, 28 April 2025.
155
I. Naar, ‘Attack on Migrant Facility in Yemen Kills Dozens, Houthis and Aid Officials Say’, The New York Times, 28 April 2025.
156
‘Houthi Group Forcibly Recruits African Migrants into Military Camps’, Asharq Al-Awsat.
157
S. Almosawa and V. Nereim, ‘They Fled War in Ethiopia. Then American Bombs Found Them’, The New York Times, 12 July 2025; Amnesty International, ‘Yemen: “It Is a Miracle We Survived”: US Air Strike on Civilians Held in Sa’ada Migrant Detention Centre’, Research Briefing, 29 October 2025, p 5.
158
ICRC, Customary IHL Rule 7: ‘The Principle of Distinction between Civilian Objects and Military Objectives’. See also, in this sense, Amnesty International, ‘Yemen: US Air Strike That Has Left Dozens of Migrants Dead Must Be Investigated’, 18 May 2025: ‘Amnesty International was unable to conclusively identify a legitimate military target within the Sa’ada prison compound.’
159
ICRC, Customary IHL Rule 16, ‘Target Verification’. See also Amnesty International, ‘Yemen: “It Is a Miracle We Survived”: US Air Strike on Civilians Held in Sa’ada Migrant Detention Centre’, Research Briefing, 29 October 2025, p 6.
160
Final Report of the UN Panel of Experts on Yemen, UN Doc S/2025/650, paras 27 and 57–62; NCIAVHR, ‘Thirteenth Periodic Report on the Work of the National Commission to Investigate Alleged Violations to Human Rights from August 1, 2024 to July 31, 2025’, p 7.
161
Letter dated 10 June 2025 from the UN Secretary-General to the President of the Security Council, UN Doc S/2025/371, p 3.
162
‘Drone Attack on a Market in Taiz Governorate’, Yemeni Archive (last accessed on 2 December 2025); NCIAVHR, ‘Thirteenth Periodic Report on the Work of the National Commission to Investigate Alleged Violations to Human Rights from August 1, 2024 to July 31, 2025’, p 22.
163
Final Report of the UN Panel of Experts on Yemen, UN Doc S/2025/650, para 60.
164
Human Rights Watch, ‘Yemen: Houthi Attack on Civilians May Be a War Crime’, 13 February 2025; NCIAVHR, ‘Thirteenth Periodic Report on the Work of the National Commission to Investigate Alleged Violations to Human Rights from August 1, 2024 to July 31, 2025’, pp 37–41.
165
ICRC, Customary IHL Rule 1: ‘The Principle of Distinction between Civilians and Combatants’; and Rule 156: ‘Definition of War Crimes’.
166
Children and armed conflict: Report of the Secretary-General, UN Doc A/79/878–S/2025/247, 17 June 2025, para 235. See also Human Rights Watch, ‘Yemen: Events of 2024’, World Report 2025, p 535.
167
Human Rights Watch, ‘Yemen: Houthis Obstructing Aid, Exacerbating Cholera’, 7 August 2024.
168
Ibid.
169
OHCHR, ‘Yemen: Türk Condemns Storming of UN Human Rights Office in Sana’a, Renews Call for Release of Detained Staff’, 13 August 2024; N. Jafarnia, ‘Houthis Raid UN Human Rights Office in Yemen’, Human Rights Watch, 16 August 2024.
170
Conflict-Related Sexual Violence: Report of the Secretary-General, UN Doc S/2025/389, 15 July 2025, paras 8 and 70.
171
ICRC, Customary IHL Rules 134–138: ‘Chapter 39. Other Persons Afforded Specific Protection’.
172
Human Rights Watch, ‘Yemen: Events of 2024’, p 534; Amnesty International, The State of the World’s Human Rights, pp 401–03; NCIAVHR, ‘Thirteenth Periodic Report on the Work of the National Commission to Investigate Alleged Violations to Human Rights from August 1, 2024 to July 31, 2025’, pp 43–50; Mwatana for Human Rights, ‘Suspended Fates: Enforced Disappearance Crimes Committed During the Armed Conflict in Yemen (2014–2025)’, August 2025, pp 27–29. See also the figures for incidents and victims per actor in the conflict documented by Mwatana for Human Rights (without any claim to completeness). Ibid, p 48.
173
Final Report of the UN Panel of Experts on Yemen, UN Doc S/2025/650, para 138; NCIAVHR, ‘Thirteenth Periodic Report on the Work of the National Commission to Investigate Alleged Violations to Human Rights from August 1, 2024 to July 31, 2025’, pp 50–51.
174
Mwatana for Human Rights, ‘Suspended Fates’, p 28.
175
See the figures quoted in Final Report of the UN Panel of Experts on Yemen, UN Doc S/2025/650, para 134: ‘Official sources reported 403 arbitrary detentions and enforced disappearances, 306 of which were attributed to the Houthis and 97 to entities affiliated with the Government.’
176
S. Al-Batati, ‘Houthis criticized after educator dies in custody’, Arab News, 23 October 2024.
177
Mwatana for Human Rights, ‘Suspended Fates’, p 49; I. Naar, ‘Arrests and Spying Charges Alarm Diplomats and Aid Workers in Yemen’, The New York Times, 29 October 2024.
178
Art 5(2)(b), Additional Protocol II of 1977; ICRC, Customary IHL Rule 117: ‘Accounting for Missing Persons’; Rule 125: ‘Correspondence of Persons Deprived of Their Liberty’; and Rule 126: ‘Visits to Persons Deprived of Their Liberty’.
179
ICRC, Customary IHL Rule 98: ‘Enforced Disappearance’.
180
Final Report of the UN Panel of Experts on Yemen, UN Doc S/2025/650, para 141.
181
Common Article 3, Geneva Conventions; Art 6, Additional Protocol II; ICRC, Customary IHL Rule 100: ‘Fair Trial Guarantees’.
182
See eg Amnesty International, ‘Huthi Authorities Must Immediately Release Arbitrarily Detained Staff from UN and Civil Society Organizations’, Press release, 4 July 2024; Office of the Special Envoy of the UN Secretary-General for Yemen, ‘Ninth Meeting of the Supervisory Committee on the Implementation of the Detainees Agreement Concludes in Oman’, Press release, 7 July 2024; ‘UN Reiterates Call to Release Staffers Detained in Yemen’, UN News, 15 August 2024; N. Jafarnia, ‘Houthis Raid UN Human Rights Office in Yemen’, Human Rights Watch, 16 August 2024; Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), ‘Yemen: Türk Condemns Storming of UN Human Rights Office in Sana’a, Renews Call for Release of Detained Staff’, Press release, 13 August 2024; Spokesperson for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Ravina Shamdasani, ‘Detained UN Staff in Yemen’, OHCHR, Geneva, 3 September 2024; Oxfam International, ‘Yemen: UN and NGOs Renew Their Call for the Immediate Release of Detained Personnel’, Press release, 13 October 2024; UNMHA, ‘Secretary-General’s Statement on One Year of Detention of United Nations and Other Personnel in Yemen’, 2 June 2025; ‘Press Statement on Houthi Detention of United Nations and International Non-governmental Organization Workers’, UN Doc SC/16079, 5 June 2025; Amnesty International, ‘Yemen: A Year on, Huthis Must Free UN, Civil Society Staff’, 30 May 2025.
183
Final Report of the UN Panel of Experts on Yemen, UN Doc S/2024/731, 11 October 2024, para 156.
184
UNMHA, ‘Note to Correspondents: On the Pause of UN Operations in Sa’ada Governorate of Yemen’, 11 February 2025; Amnesty International, ‘Yemen: A Year on, Huthis Must Free UN, Civil Society Staff’.
185
UNMHA, ‘Statement by the Secretary-General on the Death of a WFP Staff Member in Detention in Yemen’, 12 February 2025; ‘Press Statement on Houthi Detention of United Nations, International Non-Governmental Organization Workers’, Amnesty International, ‘Yemen: Investigate Death in Custody of Arbitrarily Detained UN Aid Worker’, 12 February 2025.
186
NCIAVHR, ‘Thirteenth Periodic Report on the Work of the National Commission to Investigate Alleged Violations to Human Rights from August 1, 2024 to July 31, 2025’, p 47.
187
Mwatana for Human Rights, ‘Suspended Fates’, p 61.
188
M. H. Al-Hitar and F. M. A. Al-Silwi, ‘Transitional Justice and Violations of Children’s Rights in Yemen’, Report, Yemeni Coalition for Monitoring Human Rights Violations and DT Institute, 14 October 2025, pp 7, 40–43, and 69.
189
Ibid, pp 39–40. See also Final Report of the UN Panel of Experts on Yemen, UN Doc S/2025/650, paras 150–55.
190
‘Children and Armed Conflict: Report of the Secretary-General’, UN Doc A/79/878–S/2025/247, para 229.
191
Final Report of the UN Panel of Experts on Yemen, UN Doc S/2025/650, para 164.
192
ICRC, Customary IHL Rule 156: ‘Definition of War Crimes’.
193
NCIAVHR, ‘Thirteenth Periodic Report on the Work of the National Commission to Investigate Alleged Violations to Human Rights from August 1, 2024 to July 31, 2025’, pp 27–28.
194
‘Conflict-Related Sexual Violence: Report of the Secretary-General’, UN Doc S/2025/389, 15 July 2025, para 70.
195
Final Report of the UN Panel of Experts on Yemen, UN Doc S/2025/650, para 36.
196
‘Children and Armed Conflict: Report of the Secretary-General’, UN Doc A/79/878–S/2025/247, para 234.
197
Arts 1 and 2, Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict; adopted at New York, 25 May 2000; entered into force, 12 February 2002. Yemen acceded to the Protocol in 2007.
198
Conflict-Related Sexual Violence: Report of the Secretary-General, UN Doc S/2025/389, para 70; Final Report of the UN Panel of Experts on Yemen, UN Doc S/2025/650, para 145.
199
‘Children and Armed Conflict: Report of the Secretary-General’, UN Doc A/79/878–S/2025/247, para 232; ‘Conflict-Related Sexual Violence: Report of the Secretary-General’, UN Doc S/2025/389, para 70.
200
‘Conflict-Related Sexual Violence: Report of the Secretary-General’, UN Doc S/2025/389, para 13; Report of the Special Rapporteur on torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, Alice Jill Edwards, UN Doc A/79/181, 18 July 2024, para 19; Final Report of the UN Panel of Experts on Yemen, UN Doc S/2025/650, paras 139 and 149.
201
Final Report of the UN Panel of Experts on Yemen, UN Doc S/2025/650, para 146.
202
‘Conflict-Related Sexual Violence: Report of the Secretary-General’, UN Doc S/2025/389, para 70.
203
Ibid.
204
Ibid. See also Final Report of the UN Panel of Experts on Yemen, UN Doc S/2025/650, paras 145–46.
205
See eg: National Union of Journalists, ‘Yemen: Journalist Mohammed Dabwan Al-Meyahi Sentenced to 18 Months in Prison after Social Media Posts’, Press release, 29 May 2025; Reporters without Borders, ‘Yemen: Journalist Arrests Spike across the Country, RSF Calls for Their Immediate Liberation’, 3 July 2025; Human Rights Watch, ‘We Pray to God by Torturing Journalists’: Warring Parties’ Systematic Violations Against Journalists and Press Freedom in Yemen, Report, September 2025, pp 22–34; Media Freedoms Observatory platform in Yemen (Marsadak), ‘Violations Against Media Freedoms in Yemen: Annual Report – 2024’, 19 March 2025, pp 5 and 11–12.
206
International Federation of Journalists, ‘Yemen: Al-Qaeda Confirmed Journalist’s Execution in Hadhramaut after Nine Years’ Abduction’, 5 January 2025; ‘UNESCO Director-General Condemns Killing of Journalist Mohammed Qaed’, Press release, UNESCO, 8 January 2025.
207
See National Union of Journalists, ‘Yemen: Journalist Mohammed Dabwan Al-Meyahi Sentenced to 18 Months in Prison after Social Media Posts’, 29 May 2025. Mohammed al-Nabhi, detained on 23 April 2024 and subsequently disappeared, was not told the reasons for his arrest by Houthi authorities. See Human Rights Watch, ‘“We Pray to God by Torturing Journalists”’, p 25. In the case of the detention by the STC authorities of freelance journalist Naseh Shaker, one of his friends told Human Rights Watch that ‘he believed Shaker’s work as a journalist, particularly covering abuses by warring parties, was the reason behind his disappearance’. Ibid, p 29.
208
Final Report of the UN Panel of Experts on Yemen, UN Doc S/2025/650, para 35.
209
Human Rights Watch, ‘Yemen: US Strikes on Port an Apparent War Crime’.
210
M. Mandour, ‘Israel’s Killing of 31 Yemeni Journalists Marks Deadliest Global Attack in 16 Years’, Committee to Protect Journalists, 19 September 2025.
211
See, quoting Yemeni journalist Hisham Mahmoud’s assessment that ‘[e]very party in the Yemeni war wants journalists to be mouthpieces’: R. Mohsen, ‘Yemeni journalists caught between Israeli airstrikes and authoritarian crackdown’, Index on Censorship, 3 October 2025.