September Net

Hazem Ahmed did not know that his absence from the family and work would last for five full years.

The Houthi rebel militia summoned him to a police station and told him , “Come, just for five minutes,” but the five minutes became five years of torture and suffering in secret militia prisons.

Hazem was a headmaster of a private school in the capital Sana’a. During five years of absence inside the prison, the Houthi militia transferred him to several prisons, the most recent of which was Political Security Prison.

Before his abduction, Hazem was waiting to travel with his father to India for treatment, and unfortunately, the militia abducted him and put him in prison for more than five years, without knowing about his father’s health condition. This complicated Hazem’s psychological as well as physical pain.

“On the first night of my abduction and imprisonment, the Houthi militia charged me with communicating with the legitimate government. The Houthis continued to torture me for the whole night, hoping to get information but found nothing.”

“The Houthi militia stopped torturing me for only two days, and then returned to investigate me on charges of my work and association with the Yemeni legitimate government,” Hazem said.

“I was asking the militia to release me only for a short time to treat my father, but they refused, just as they refused to make a phone call to my father and family to check on father’s health.” he added.

“I was surprised that they were asking me for my car in exchange for my release from prison.” Hazem said. “For my father’s health, I gave them my car. However, I was not released from the prison where I spent five years.”

he said. “For five years we haven’t seen the sun, we haven’t been exposed to it, resulting in many of the abductees getting different diseases,” he explained.

“We were never allowed to take shower or wash clothes,” Hazem recounted some of the scenes of physical and psychological torture in Houthi militia prisons.