UN halts operations in Yemen’s Saada after staff detained

The United Nations has suspended its operations in Yemen's Saada region, a stronghold of the Iran-backed Houthi rebels, after multiple UN personnel were detained there this year, a spokesperson said on February 10.

The decision follows the arrest of at least eight UN workers by the Houthis in January, including six in Saada, amid a broader crackdown that has seen dozens of staffers from humanitarian organizations detained since mid-2024, Caliber.Az reports per foreign media.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has instructed agencies to pause all activities in the region due to the lack of security guarantees, deputy UN spokesperson Farhan Haq told reporters in New York.

"This extraordinary and temporary measure seeks to balance the imperative to stay and deliver with the need to have the safety and security of UN personnel and its partners guaranteed," Haq said.

"The pause will allow time for the de facto authorities and the United Nations to arrange the release of arbitrarily detained UN personnel and ensure that the necessary conditions are in place to deliver critical humanitarian support."

Haq did not specify how many Yemenis would be affected by the suspension.

The UN had initially reported in late January that seven staff members had been detained, later revising the figure to eight. These arrests add to the dozens of UN and NGO personnel detained since June 2024.

The Houthis have alleged that some of those detained in June were part of "an American-Israeli spy network" operating under the guise of humanitarian work—claims the UN Human Rights Office has strongly rejected.

To recap, Yemen has been embroiled in a civil war for nearly a decade. The conflict escalated in 2015 when a Saudi-led coalition intervened after the Houthis seized the capital, Sanaa, in September 2014. The war has caused hundreds of thousands of deaths, both directly and indirectly, due to violence, disease, and widespread humanitarian crises.

The UN has repeatedly called for the protection of humanitarian workers and the release of those detained, warning that continued restrictions on aid operations could deepen the suffering of millions of Yemenis.

By Aghakazim Guliyev