NGOS SLAM USING CHILDREN AS HUMAN SHIELDS BY REBELS

SANA'A, Sept.07 (Saba) - Non-Government Organizations (NGOs) for
childhood care in Yemen have expressed their conviction to using
children as human shields by the rebels group in some areas of
Yemen's northern province of Saada.

In a statement issued by those organizations, they described those
acts as irresponsible and reckless, affirming their condemnation for
the criminal acts carried out by al-Houthi rebels against children
and involving them in fighting.

Meanwhile, the organizations denounced in its statement the genocide
of ten children and six women by al-Houthi rebels in Thuaib area in
Saada province recently.

They considered this operation as a dangerous sign and an act
opposing Islam and all international laws and pacts related to
childhood protection.

The Yemeni organizations called on all national and international
organizations and the World Commission on the Rights of Child to
work together to face up to this criminal group, requesting to
penalize it for what it committed against children.

A local source in Saada province has announced that this group force
families to direct their children to carry weapons and send them to
the battlefronts beside the rebellion fighters.

For its part, SEYAJ organization for childhood protection has
decried using children in fighting by the rebels as well as using
villages inhabited by people for sheltering, saying that expose the
civilians to the risk of death and dislodging them from their homes
and these styles are convicted and unacceptable.

The inhuman acts by the al-Houthi followers come as the army has
recently expanded an offensive against them and which was prompted
by continued violence and lawbreaking by the rebels.

The relief organizations face difficulties while trying to get the
displaced because most of the people are not at camps. Many families
moved to their relatives in other nearby areas.

Al- Houthi rebels have been launching intermittent wars against the
troops since 2004.

Since the fighting erupted in 2004, thousands of people, soldiers
and insurgents have been killed in Saada province, which located
close to border with Saudi Arabia, after the rebel group was founded
by rebel leader Hussein al- Houthi.

Hussein, the eldest brother of the current group leader Abdul-Malik,
was killed by the army in September 2004.

The Yemeni government accuses the Houthi group of trying to
reinstall the rule of imams, which was toppled by a republican
revolution in northern Yemen in 1962.

According to the UN mission there are more than 160.000 displaced
people due to the recent confrontations between the army and rebels.

BA