HR report documents violations, crimes in “Mashra’ah and Hadnan” in Taiz

Taiz Network for Rights and Freedoms issued an expanded analytical human rights report documenting a series of grave violations and crimes that targeted civilians from Al-Rumaimah family and residents of Mashra’ah and Hadnan area in Taiz governorate by the mercenaries of the Saudi-American aggression during the year 2015, coinciding with the 11th annual anniversary of those bloody events.

The network stated in a press release, a copy of which was received by the Yemeni News Agency (Saba), that the report is the outcome of an intensive investigative and methodical process based on collecting, reviewing, and auditing a broad package of field materials, live testimonies of survivors and victims’ families, criminal documents and evidence, as well as documented records of data on victims, detainees, and the forcibly disappeared. This comes in the context of its principled commitment to preserving the national memory and safeguarding evidence and facts from extinction to make them available to judicial accountability bodies and future tracks of redress and reparations.

The report reviewed the chronological and spatial sequence of the field escalation path of the Saudi enemy’s mercenaries, going beyond the limits of news description to deconstructing the organized structure of violations. It explained that the operations were not merely military clashes in limited scopes, but extended directly and systematically to touch residential neighborhoods, vital roads, water networks, and sources of livelihood. This manifested through the preliminary stage (mid-July 2015): the spark of escalation was ignited and the expansion of military targeting reached the heart of populated civilian gatherings.

This was followed by the stage of siege and operational tightening by imposing strict restrictions on the movement of population and vital supplies, and the collapse of local de-escalation initiatives under the weight of continued shelling and sniping operations. Next came the stage of comprehensive attacks (late July and early August 2015) by executing wide-scale storming operations targeting Hadnan village and its surroundings, accompanied by liquidations, arson, and forced displacement.

– Documenting Complex Patterns of Violations

The report stated that deep examination of criminal materials and field testimonies revealed the commission of a complex system of violations by the aggression’s mercenaries, touching all elements of life. Foremost among these were: intentional killing and direct injury of unarmed civilians, with focused targeting of the most vulnerable groups of women and children via sniper fire and direct attacks; night raids on residential homes; systematic looting of contents; burning and destroying residential houses to strip locals of shelter; destroying livelihood sources, private properties, and facilities of civilian and religious character; contaminating drinking water sources to double human suffering; cutting off public roads; imposing a suffocating blockade hindering the entry of relief aid, food, and medicine; preventing ambulances and rescue teams from reaching and evacuating the wounded and injured; mass forced displacement and eviction of families under gunpoint; exposing fleeing people to severe security risks during displacement; and establishing armed checkpoints to practice illegal detentions, arbitrary arrests, and forced interrogations outside the framework of the law.

The report noted that counting the victims was assigned dedicated digital records, databases, and independent numbered proof annexes according to documentation standards to link every incident to its direct evidentiary file.

– Legal Qualification and Suspicions of Genocide, Ethnic, and Sectarian Cleansing

At the level of legal analysis, the report examined the events in light of the rules and principles of International Humanitarian Law and International Human Rights Law. It concluded that a complex pattern of crimes and violations exists, representing a flagrant breach of the rules of International Humanitarian Law and International Human Rights Law, as many of the documented acts—according to their elements and the circumstances of their commission—rise to the level of war crimes and crimes against humanity.

The report also concluded that the entirety of the facts, the context of their commission, and the documented patterns raise a serious and strong legal suspicion of the commission of the “crime of genocide,” constituting a blatant pattern of “ethnic and sectarian cleansing,” in accordance with the legal elements and pillars established for each characterization, and based on the nature of the committed acts, criminal behavior, their scope, patterns, targeted victims, the concentrated targeting pattern against a specific population group, the level of field repetition, the context in which they occurred, and what the evidence reveals regarding the existence of special intent or a policy or an organized behavioral pattern.

– Individual Criminal Responsibility and Command Responsibility

Based on the proof of grave acts and their advanced legal qualification, the report concludes that full international and individual criminal responsibility is incurred for these crimes and the resulting catastrophic impacts, destruction, and displacement. This responsibility is not limited to direct perpetrators alone, but extends to include commanders, superiors, and effective authorities under the provisions of Articles (25, 28, 30) of the Rome Statute and the rules of International Criminal Law.

In this analytical context, joint and legal liability is proven against: leaders of the Islah Party militias and takfiri groups, groups controlling the governorate for violations occurring within their scope of control or by their formations, and the leadership of the aggression coalition led by Saudi Arabia as commanders overseeing and controlling the theater of operations who provide financial funding and military support to these militias. All these parties bear full and effective criminal and legal responsibility for those crimes and their consequences, to prevent any impunity and ensure justice for the victims.

– Preserving Memory and the Path of Justice

The Taiz Network for Rights and Freedoms emphasized in its statement that the passage of time and eleven years since the commission of these massacres does not touch the essence of justice, nor does the statute of limitations extinguish the inherent right of victims and their families to reveal the truth. It pointed out that the length of time increases the urgency to preserve documents and evidence before they are lost or forgotten amid the disruption of accountability mechanisms.

It noted that this work represents a foundational block within an integrated human rights project aimed at building a comprehensive and documented database for all victims and violations witnessed in Taiz, and drafting legal files ready for litigation before national courts and competent international judicial committees and bodies.

– Recommendations of the Human Rights Report

The report recommended that judicial and human rights bodies and the international community open independent, comprehensive, and transparent criminal judicial investigations to examine the details of the documented incidents, identify the perpetrators and those who ordered the attacks, establish immediate mechanisms to protect witnesses, safeguard evidence, clues, and criminal exhibits from tampering or extinction, and guarantee the right of victims and their families to know the full truth.

The recommendations demanded the application of the principle of non-impunity against perpetrators of grave violations, the provision of comprehensive reparation mechanisms, and fair compensation to affected and forcibly displaced persons.

It urged the rehabilitation of the residential and economic environment of the region, prioritizing cases of murder, liquidation, sniping, and destruction of civilian objects in upcoming criminal investigation files, continuing field documentation of crimes and violations in Taiz Governorate and across the Republic committed by the coalition of aggression countries led by Saudi Arabia and its mercenaries, and referring completed files to competent local judicial accountability mechanisms.