[15/07/2017 03:02]

MARIB-SABA
The coup militias in all their pastwars used educational and health facilities as military outposts and detention and torture places.

But the recent gains the national army achieved in al-Makhdarahof Marib revealed a more awful form of abuse of service facilities; Upon overrunning Najran village in the mentioned area, the army found hundreds of improvised explosives in the village's school.

The militiamen used the school to manufacture them. Ingredient materials of which the bombs are made were also seized.

The chief of Military Engineering Branch at the Third Military Region Brig. SalehTareeqsaid his comrades managed to unearth 4500 landmines from 5 sq km area of Al-Makhdarah which totals 25 sq km, all cleared the rebel fighters.

Tareeq said that "before their withdrawal, the militia largely planted landmines in roads, farms, valleys and even drinking water wells and under water pumps."

He appealed to the local government of Marib and the intrernational organizations concerned to help with demining expertise, for the number of UXOs planted is beyond the military engineers' capabilities. "Some of the landmines have been buried and displaced because of the torrential rains that fell."

The landmines are a big detriment that prevents many IDPs from thinking of return to their hometowns and villages in Marib and Yemen as a whole.

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