Houthis zwangsrekrutieren Kindersoldaten

Die Barabrei im Jemen geht weiter:

Yemen's Houthi militants are storming public schools in rebel-held areas to recruit students as fighters, taking some away by force without telling their families, local residents have told The National.

It comes after Yemeni news sites on Sunday published a letter from the president of the so-called Supreme Political Council — which rules Sanaa and other rebel-held territory — to the chairman of the rebel movement's Revolutionary Committee, ordering him to begin recruiting male students for military training from all public universities and primary and secondary schools under Houthi control.

The letter did not stipulate the age of the students that should be "recruited" but pro-government forces have in the past arrested Houthi fighters as young as 10.

"They (the Houthis) started to come to the public schools, especially the secondary schools, to encourage students to stand with them against the enemy and the Saudi 'colonisation', as they say," Hamood, a resident of Ibb province, told The National.

"They give them religious handouts and encourage them to register military training." If the students do not sign up voluntarily "then they start to select the older ones and take them by force to begin a short period of military training before sending them to the battlefronts".

Hamood, who asked to be identified by his first name only, said the Houthis were doing this without informing the students' families of their whereabouts.