Survivors of Strikes on Yemeni Detention Center Recount 'Another Crime' of Saudi-Led War


Survivors of Strikes on Yemeni Detention Center Recount 'Another Crime' of Saudi-Led War

TEHRAN (Tasnim) –Yemeni detainees who were lucky enough to survive, recounted the scary experience of their position being hit by a missile fired from the Saudi-led coalition warplanes and being able to escape before a second bomb fell.

"When they struck Ward 8, the door opened and we walked out... the door opened from the pressure and we walked out. God granted us safety, thank God," one survivor said, recounting the strikes that targeted the detention center where he was held on Friday at dawn, Reuters reported.

Others, wrapped in white body bags, weren't that lucky. At least 60 people were killed when missiles hit the detention center in the Yemeni province of Sa'ada.

A Reuters witness said several people, including African migrants, were killed in another air raid.

Save the Children said in a statement that three children were also reportedly killed by air strikes on Friday in the western city of Hudaydah.  

The strikes have caused an international uproar and brought back attention to a forgotten and deadly conflict, as the United Nations condemned the attack.

The strikes, the deadliest in more than two years, came amid an unprecedented escalation in the seven-year-old conflict with clashes raging over the control of Yemen's oil-rich regions Shabwa and Marib, and uptick in corss-border attacks.

In Sa'ada, hundreds of people gathered around lined-up body bags on Saturday near concrete rubble of the detention centre, seeking information about their relatives. Some were checking the bodies hoping to identify their loved ones.

"We came from Amran province on a visit to find out that the prison has been hit by warplanes. This is a another crime to be added to their other crimes," said Salman Badi, one of the relatives.

Sultan al-Qahim, one of the wounded with burns on his face, said he lost consciousness after a third bomb fell.

"I was sitting with my mates in our ward and then the warplane came and hit with a first strike. And a while later, two more air strikes hit. After that, nothing,” he said in the Republican hospital in Sa'ada, where most of the wounded have been treated.

United Nations envoy for Yemen Hans Grundberg voiced grave concern over the military escalation and called on both sides to "exercise maximum restraint".

Yemen also lost its connection to the internet nationwide after Saudi-led airstrikes targeted a site in the contested city of Hudaydah.

Saudi Arabia, backed by the United States and regional allies, launched the war on Yemen in March 2015, with the goal of bringing the government of former Yemeni president Abd Rabbuh Mansour Hadi back to power and crushing the Ansarullah movement.

The war has left hundreds of thousands of Yemenis dead and displaced millions more. It has also destroyed Yemen’s infrastructure and spread famine and infectious diseases there.

Despite heavily-armed Saudi Arabia’s incessant bombardment of the impoverished country, the Yemeni armed forces and the Popular Committees have grown steadily in strength against the Saudi-led invaders and left Riyadh and its allies bogged down in the country.

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