UN employee dies in Houthi detention center in Saada, northern Yemen

A UN employee died in a Houthi militia detention center in Saada Governorate, northern Yemen, hours after the UN suspended its programs in the governorate in protest against the militia’s continued detention of UN employees.

Xinhua news agency quoted a UN source on Tuesday as saying that Ahmed Ba'alawi, an employee of the UN World Food Programme, died last night in a Houthi detention centre in Saada province, northern Yemen.

The source confirmed that Ba'alawi is a Yemeni national and works as an IT operations officer in the UN program.

The source indicated that the victim, Ba'alawi, is one of seven program employees who were arrested last January while performing their work in Sa'dah Governorate.

For his part, a security source in the militia authorities in Sana'a confirmed the death of a UN employee in his place of detention in Saada, without further details.

Earlier on Monday, the United Nations announced the suspension of its humanitarian programs and work in the main Houthi stronghold - Saada, Yemen - in protest against the militia's detention of UN employees.

The UN organization said in a statement that Secretary-General Antonio Guterres directed UN agencies, funds and programs - in the absence of security conditions and necessary guarantees - to temporarily suspend all operations and programs in Saada Governorate in Yemen.

She added that the directive came after the de facto authorities (the Houthis) recently detained 8 additional UN employees, 6 of whom work in Saada, which affected the UN's ability to work there.

On January 23, the Houthis kidnapped 8 UN employees in a campaign that was the second to target UN employees in months. As a result of that campaign, the United Nations announced the following day the suspension of all official UN movements in areas under the control of the terrorist Houthi militias supported by the Iranian regime.

For his part, the Secretary-General of the United Nations, Antonio Guterres, called on the Houthi militia to immediately and unconditionally release those who were recently detained, as well as the staff of the United Nations, international and national non-governmental organizations, civil society and diplomatic missions who have been arbitrarily detained since June 2024, in addition to the United Nations staff detained since 2021 and 2023.