[01/10/2026 01:05]

GENEVA-SABA

Head of the Irada Organization Against Torture and Enforced Disappearance Jamal al-Maamari said Houthi summer camps recruited around 461,000 students this year as part of efforts to indoctrinate them with sectarian ideology and prepare them for combat.

Speaking during a UN Human Rights Council session under Item 9 on racial discrimination, al-Maamari said the camps seek to turn children into fighters indoctrinated with Twelver Shiite ideology imported from Iran and push them into attacks on Yemeni cities and abuses against civilians.

He called on the Human Rights Council to condemn these practices, hold those responsible accountable and take action to halt what he described as the systematic destruction of childhood and Yemeni society.

Al-Maamari said the Houthi militia has imposed systematic racial and sectarian discrimination based on an exclusionary ideology that claims a “divine right” and treats Yemenis as mere subjects and slaves.

He said that since the Houthis seized power in 2014, the militia has dismantled state institutions, killed more than 500,000 Yemenis and abducted academics, politicians, activists and journalists. He added that UN personnel and humanitarian workers have also been targeted, with some currently held in prisons in Sana’a alongside thousands of civilian detainees.

He said the Houthis’ discriminatory practices have also extended to education, describing them as a systematic campaign against future generations. The militia, he added, is targeting around 1.6 million students in areas under its control through indoctrination and sweeping changes to school curricula.

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