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An impoverished, politically volatile nation on the southwest tip of the Arabian Peninsula, Yemen is caught between increasing Islamist violence and the US-led "global war on terror." The country is also grappling with armed conflict in the north, separatist campaigns in the south, and a flood of refugees from war-torn Somalia, which lies across the pirate-infested Gulf of Aden. Rampant corruption, chronic hunger, and high unemployment fuel alienation within the country's burgeoning youth population.[3]
Yemen is also a nexus for international weapons trafficking, particularly to Somalia, and is awash in firearms, which are said to outnumber its 22.2 million inhabitants nearly three to one.[4] Tribes control much of the territory outside major cities, and some of them routinely kidnap Yemeni officials and foreign tourists in order to press demands on the government. Adding to the country's bleak outlook, Yemen is running low on both water and oil, which provides 75 percent of the government's revenue.[5]
A Resurgent al Qaeda
Al Qaeda's presence in Yemen has surged in the past two years, compounding US concerns about repatriating detainees from Bagram and Guantanamo. In September 2008, an al Qaeda-coordinated suicide bombing at the gates of the US Embassy in the capital of Sanaa killed 18 people-17 Yemenis and one Yemeni-American. It was the deadliest single strike against a US target outside Iraq or Afghanistan since September 11, 2001.[6]
Al Qaeda announced in January 2009 that it would merge with militant groups from neighboring Saudi Arabia and would henceforth call itself "al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula." Saudi officials said that month that they believe many of the 85 al Qaeda fugitives they were seeking were in Yemen.[7]The new group has said its goals include training recruits to fight Israel in Gaza and using Yemen as a base to stage attacks in the Arabian Peninsula and the Horn of Africa.[8]
Al Qaeda's activities in Yemen form part of a broader pattern of Islamist armed militancy in the overwhelmingly Muslim country, which is Osama bin Laden's ancestral homeland.[9] In the 1980s, the Yemeni government reportedly recruited fighters for the US-backed war against the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, and welcomed other foreign fighters from that conflict to settle in Yemen.[10] In the 1990s, Yemenis continued to train in Afghanistan under Taliban rule. After thousands of fighters returned home in the early 1990s, President Ali Abdullah Saleh, who has led Yemen for three decades, incorporated many of them into his security forces.[11]
Among other campaigns, President Saleh has enlisted veterans of the Afghan war in numerous battles against an armed movement of influential Shia Zaidis in the north.[12] He also used these so-called Afghan Arab fighters to win a 1994 civil war in the south, which had been a separate, socialist state until 1990.[13]
Many Yemeni Afghan war veterans remain entrenched in the country's political and military apparatus, and belong to influential tribes whose sheikhs form an integral part of President Saleh's power base, complicating counterterrorism efforts.
Some al Qaeda elements are further insulated by a fundamentalist Islamic movement that has spread south from Saudi Arabia and helped make the powerful Islah (Reform) Party the second-largest party in Yemen. Although Islah includes substantial moderate elements, one of its prominent figures is Sheikh Abdul Majeed al-Zindani, who allegedly is bin Laden's erstwhile spiritual leader, an allegation al-Zindani denies.[14]
After the al Qaeda-linked bombing of the US Navy destroyer USS Cole in 2000, which killed 17 sailors, Saleh's government engaged al Qaeda suspects and sympathizers in religious dialogue. Saleh reportedly allowed graduates of the dialogue program to move freely provided they abstained from violent acts inside Yemen.[15]
But counterterrorism sweeps over the past three years, in which Yemeni security forces killed some al Qaeda fugitives and detained hundreds of suspects, angered a new generation of armed insurgents who fought in Iraq and reject the Afghan war veterans' marriage of convenience with authorities. Younger al Qaeda members or suspected affiliates have been implicated in a series of ensuing attacks, including the US Embassy bombing in 2008. The new generation operates from rugged, tribal hinterlands beyond the central government's reach and its attacks are increasingly sophisticated.[16]
Al Qaeda in Yemen issues statements and recruits through the internet, particularly via an online journal it launched in January 2008 named Sada al-Malahem, or The Echo of Battles. It reportedly has used the journal to woo al Qaeda members fleeing counterterrorism crackdowns in Saudi Arabia. "Come to Yemen," a fugitive al Qaeda leader believed to be hiding in Yemen was quoted as saying in The Echo of Battles in March 2008.[17]
Disaffected Yemenis often glamorize al Qaeda, according to Murad Zafir, deputy director of the Yemen office of the National Democratic Institute, a nonprofit organization whose donors include the US Agency for International Development. Said Zafir:
Al Qaeda is no longer a structure; it's more of an ideology for the young, the marginalized, the idealistic. It has become to the current generation what the Red Star or Che Guevara used to be in years past.[18]
The US-Yemeni Relationship
US officials describe counterterrorism as "the first among equals" of US priorities in Yemen.[19] Although the US State Department calls Yemen "an important partner in the global war on terrorism,"[20] bilateral relations have been strained by the country's mixed record on combating al Qaeda.
Al Qaeda's first major strike against the United States in Yemen was the 2000 bombing of the USS Cole. Initially, the US government faulted Yemen's probe of the attack.[21] Two months after the September 11 attacks, however, President Saleh visited Washington to pledge cooperation in fighting terrorism.
Since then, the president's security forces have frequently partnered with US officials on counterterrorism initiatives and say they have rounded up hundreds of alleged terrorist suspects, including 50 in the first six weeks of 2009.[22] The United States, in turn, has given Yemen more than US$90 million for military programs since 2002, including funds that go to the Interior Ministry's Anti-Terrorism Unit.[23]
To the United States' dismay, however, President Saleh has earned a reputation for cracking down on terrorist suspects with one hand while striking deals with them with the other.In what US diplomats acknowledge is a strain on relations, Yemen has rebuffed US requests to extradite Yemeni-American Jaber al-Banna and Jamal Muhammad al-Badawi, who are convicted of al Qaeda-related activities in Yemen and are on the US Federal Bureau of Investigation's (FBI) most-wanted terrorists list.[24] As Yemeni citizens, both are protected from extradition under Yemen's constitution. US authorities have indicted al-Banna for providing material support to al Qaeda and al-Badawi for the 2000 bombing of the USS Cole.
Exacerbating US frustration, a Yemeni court in November 2008 halved al-Banna's 10-year sentence on terrorism-related charges. Both men were part of a spectacular jailbreak in 2006 in which 23 al Qaeda members or alleged affiliates tunneled their way out of a maximum-security prison; three are still on the loose and 10 are free on security guarantees.[25] Many political analysts and journalists suspect the jail breakers had help from some government officials.
In the first two months of 2009, President Saleh released 112 prisoners, as many as 34 of whom are believed to have been suspected al Qaeda members or associates, although Saleh denies any were militants.[26]
Counterterrorism Abuses
Yemen's erratic approach to fighting terrorism is coupled with a tenuous respect for the rule of law and significant human rights violations.[27] Although the Yemeni government denies any abuses, it increasingly appears to be using counterterrorism tactics as a tool to silence journalists and political opponents.[28] US Embassy officials say they have voiced disapproval of these practices to Yemeni officials.[29]
Yemeni human rights groups believe government security forces have arbitrarily arrested hundreds of alleged terrorist suspects in the past eight years, holding many of them without charge for days, months, or years. Suspects are often held incommunicado in degrading conditions in unregistered detention facilities.[30] In many cases, if the suspects themselves cannot be found, the security forces detain their male relatives as hostages.
Yemen's Code of Criminal Procedures stipulates that individuals cannot be arrested unless apprehended in a criminal act or served with an arrest warrant. Detainees must be arraigned within 24 hours of arrest or be released. The law also states that a detainee may not be held longer than seven days without a court order. It prohibits incommunicado detention, provides detainees with the right to inform their families of their arrests, and to decline to answer questions without an attorney present.[31]
However, Yemen's fragile judicial system provides scant oversight over the arrest and detention of alleged terrorists. In part, that is because most such arrests are made by the Political Security Organization and the National Security Bureau, which were established by decree and answer directly to the president, making them virtually immune from judicial oversight. Their jails are not listed as official places of detention as required by the Yemeni constitution.[32]
When terrorist cases are prosecuted, they go before the Specialized Criminal Court (SCC), which President Saleh created in 1999 to prosecute national security crimes.[33] But this court falls short of international fair trial standards and local human rights groups consider it unconstitutional. Defense lawyers say they are often denied access to their clients' files, and that judges have ignored complaints of forced confessions, torture, and other violations.[34]
In January 2009, the SCC upheld a six-year terrorism-related sentence against prominent journalist Abdel Karim al-Khaiwani, ignoring a presidential pardon he had received four months earlier. President Saleh pardoned him again in March 2009. Local human rights groups interpreted the moves as a way to intimidate al-Khaiwani into silence. An outspoken critic of the government, al-Khaiwani had been jailed in 2008 for membership in a terrorist cell linked to a Shia rebellion in the north (not to al Qaeda), but the public evidence against him consisted of photographs of the fighting, an interview with a rebel leader, and an article critical of President Saleh.[35]
Three draft laws currently pending before the Yemeni Parliament, which is dominated by Saleh loyalists, would vastly expand the government's powers to arrest and detain individuals as terrorist suspects. The abusive arrest and detention practices the government has used against political opponents give good reason to fear that the vaguely worded proposals, if adopted into law, would be used to repress legitimate dissent as well as to target suspected terrorists.[36] Among other measures, the laws would expand the scope of the death penalty and allow warrantless wiretapping and property seizures for up to 90 days.[37]
[3] Yemen ranked 141st out of 180 countries in Transparency International's "2008 Corruption Perceptions Index," September 23, 2008, http://www.transparency.org/news_room/in_focus/2008/cpi2008/cpi_2008_table (accessed January 21, 2009). The US government says Yemeni officials "frequently engage in corrupt practices with impunity:" US State Department, Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor, "Country Reports on Human Rights Practices – 2008: Yemen," February 25, 2009, http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2008/nea/119130.htm (accessed February 25, 2009) sec. 3. Yemen also is the poorest country in the Middle East, and ranks 153rd out of 177 countries in the 2007 United Nations Development Program's Human Development Index. Approximately 42 percent of its people live in poverty, one in five are malnourished, and 35 percent of its workers are unemployed, according to the World Bank, "Yemen," http://web.worldbank.org/WBSITE/EXTERNAL/COUNTRIES/MENAEXT/YEMENEXTN/0,,menuPK:310170~pagePK:141159~piPK:141110~theSitePK:310165,00.html (accessed January 21, 2009).
[4] "Security Council Re-Establishes Panel Monitoring Somalia Arms Embargo," UN press release, SC/9546, December 19, 2008, http://www.un.org/News/Press/docs/2008/sc9546.doc.htm (accessed January 20, 2009). Yemen has an estimated 60million weapons, according to Jeremy M. Sharp, "Yemen: Background and US Relations," Congressional Research Service, RL34170, January 22, 2009, http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/mideast/RL34170.pdf (accessed February 26, 2009), p. 5.
[5] Sheba Center for Strategic Studies, "Yemen: Bell Tolls for Water Catastrophe," news release, August 12, 2008, http://shebacss.com/en/news.php?id=1443 (accessed February 10, 2009). See also Ginny Hill, Yemen, Fear of Failure,Chatham House briefing paper, November 2008, http://www.chathamhouse.org.uk/publications/papers/view/-/id/677/ (accessed December 8, 2008), pp. 7-8.
[6] Michael Isikoff and Mark Hosenball, "Deadly Training Ground: Are Al Qaeda fighters returning homefrom Iraq to launch new attacks against US targets?"Newsweek, September17, 2008, http://www.newsweek.com/id/159420 (accessed January 21, 2009).
[7]In addition, the deputy commander of al Qaeda on the Arabian Peninsula reportedly told a Yemeni journalist that several other Saudis had come to Yemen to join al Qaeda, according to Maggie Michael, "Report: Ex-Gitmo detainee joins al Qaeda in Yemen," Associated Press, January 23, 2009, http://www.miamiherald.com/news/world/story/870457.html (accessed January 23, 2009).
[8] In February 2009, US Director of National Intelligence Dennis C. Blair said that "Yemen is reemerging as a jihadist battleground and potential regional base of operations for al Qaeda to plan internal and external attacks, train terrorists, and facilitate the movement of operatives." Al Qaeda could use Yemen "to supplement its external operations agenda, promote turmoil in Saudi Arabia, and weaken the Saleh regime," he added. US Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, "Intelligence Community Annual Threat Assessment," February 11, 2009, http://www.dni.gov/testimonies/20090212_testimony.pdf (accessed February 26, 2009), p. 7.
[9]An estimated 53 percent of Yemenis are Sunni Muslims and another 45 percent are followers of the Zaidi branch of Shi'ism that ruled Yemen for a millennium until an Army-led revolution in 1962, according to the United Nations Refugee Agency. Integrated Regional Information Networks (IRIN), Yemen: The conflict in Saada Governorate-analysis, 24 July 2008, http://www.unhcr.org/refworld/docid/488f180d1e.html (accessed 16 March 2009).
[10]Siddharth Ramana, "Yemen: Al Qaeda's Homecoming," Middle East Strategic Information, October 13, 2008, http://mesi.org.uk/ViewBlog.aspx?ArticleId=35 (accessed December 8, 2008), para. 18; Christopher Boucek, Shazadi Beg, and John Horgan, "Opening up the Jihadi Debate: Yemen's Committee for Dialogue," in Leaving Terrorism Behind: Disengagement from Political Violence,Tore Bjørgo and John Horgan, eds. (New York: Routledge, September 2008), p. 189.
[11] Boucek, Beg, and Horgan, "Opening up the Jihadi Debate: Yemen's Committee for Dialogue," p. 182.
[12] Ibid.
[13] Ibid.
[14] Al-Zindani is the founder of Iman University in Sanaa, which the United States has accused of being a recruiting area for armed militants, though defenders say the school neither sponsors nor condones insurgency. The United States placed al-Zindani on its terrorist list in 2004. "United States Designates bin Laden Loyalist," US Treasury Department press release, February 24, 2004, http://www.ustreas.gov/press/releases/js1190.htm (accessed January 22, 2009). The United Nations also has placed al-Zindani on a list of al Qaeda members or associates. "Security Council Al Qaeda, Taliban Sanctions Committee," UN Security Council press release, SC/8785/Rev. 1, July 26 2006, http://www.un.org/News/Press/docs/2006/sc8785.doc.htm (accessed January 22, 2009). President Saleh publicly supports al-Zindani.
[15] Boucek, Beg, and Horgan, "Opening up the Jihadi Debate: Yemen's Committee for Dialogue," p. 182; Gregory Johnsen, "Al Qaeda's generational split," The Boston Globe, November 9, 2007, http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2007/11/09/al_qaedas_generational_split/ (accessed December 8, 2008).
[16]Central Intelligence Agency, "Transcript of Remarks by Central Intelligence Agency Director Michael Hayden at the Atlantic Council," November 13, 2008, https://www.cia.gov/news-information/speeches-testimony/speeches-testimony-archive-2008/directors-remarks-at-the-atlantic-council.html (accessed January 24, 2009).
[17]Nicole Stracke, "Al Qaeda in Yemen appeals to 'Saudi Brothers,'" Gulf Research Center newsletter, May 8, 2008, http://www.grc.ae/index.php?frm_action=view_newsletter_web&sec_code=grcanalysis&frm_module=contents&show_web_list_link=1&int_content_id=49636&, para. 1 (accessed January 24, 2009).
[18] Human Rights Watch interview with Murad Zafir, deputy director, National Democratic Institute, Yemeni office, Sanaa, Yemen, December 14, 2008.
[19] Human Rights Watch interview with a US Embassy official, Sanaa, Yemen, December 14, 2008.
[20] US State Department, Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs, "Background Notes – Yemen," December 2007, http://www.state.gov/r/pa/ei/bgn/35836.htm (accessed January 21, 2009).
[21]Alfred B. Prados and Jeremy M. Sharp, "Yemen: Current Conditions and US Relations," Congressional Research Service Report, RS21808, January 4, 2007, http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/mideast/RS21808.pdf (accessed January 20, 2009), p. 2.
[22] "Yemeni-Saudi al Qaeda Combination Media Propaganda, Minister," Saba Net, Yemen, February 10, 2009, http://www.sabanews.net/en/news175793.htm.
[23] US State Department, Congressional Budget Justification, Foreign Operations, Near East, Yemen: FY 2009, http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/101368.pdf, pp. 577-78; FY 2008, http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/84462.pdf, pp. 524-26, FY 2007, http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/60641.pdf, pp. 480-81, FY 2006, http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/42258.pdf, pp. 463-65, FY 2005, http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/28978.pdf, pp. 436-36, FY 2004, http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/17788.pdf, pp. 415-16 (retrieved February 11, 2009).
[24] Human Rights Watch interviews with two US Embassy officials, Sanaa, Yemen, December 14, 2008.
[25]Seven other escapees were killed-two in suicide bombings, four in clashes with the Yemeni government, and one from rounds fired in a sea-to-ground attack by the USS Chafee warship in Somalia-and one was released from prison in February 2009 after extradition from Kenya, according to Gregory Johnsen, a Ph.D. candidate in Near Eastern Studies at Princeton University and co-editor of a forthcoming book on Islam and armed insurgency in Yemen. Email communication from Johnsen to Human Rights Watch, February 29, 2009.
[26]Email communication from Johnsen, February 26, 2009, and interview with anonymous Yemen analyst, February 25, 2009.
[27]The US State Department's "Country Reports on Human Rights Practices – 2008: Yemen," http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2008/nea/119130.htm, sec. 1 (c), cites "significant human rights problems" including "irregular and in some cases . . . non-existent" application of laws governing arrests and detainment, credible reports of torture, and detention of terrorist suspects without due process. The Yemeni government is also responsible for widespread enforced disappearances and arbitrary arrests since 2004 in connection with the recurring armed conflict in northern Sa'da governorate. See Human Rights Watch, Disappearances and Arbitrary Arrests in the Armed Conflict with Huthi Rebels in Yemen, http://www.hrw.org/en/reports/2008/10/24/disappearances-and-arbitrary-arrests-armed-conflict-huthi-rebels-yemen-0, pp. 2-8.
[28]Human Rights Watch interviews with members of the Yemeni nongovernmental organizations National Organization for Defending Rights and Freedom (HOOD), the Yemeni Observatory for Human Rights, and the Yemen chapter of al-Karama for Human Rights, Sanaa, Yemen, December 13-20, 2008.
[29] Human Rights Watch interview with a US Embassy official, December 14, 2008.
[30] Human Rights Watch interviews with HOOD, Yemeni Observatory for Human Rights, and Al-Karama, Sanaa, Yemen, December 13-20, 2008. HOOD's Executive Secretary Ahmed Arman estimated that, at that time, Yemeni authorities were holding more than 300 people without charge as terrorist suspects.
[31]Republican Decree, By Law No. 13 for 1994, Concerning the Criminal Procedures[Yemen].No. 13 for 1994.12 October 1994, available online in UNHCR Refworld at: http://www.unhcr.org/refworld/docid/3fc4bc374.html, (accessed February 9, 2009), arts. 7, 73, 76, 77, 176, 190.
[32] "Republican Decision on Law no. 13 of Year 1994 Regarding Criminal Procedures," President of the Republic, art. 84.9. Yemen's Constitution prohibits detention "in any place not authorized under the Prisons Administration law," Constitution of the Republic of Yemen, 2001, art. 48.b.
[33]Republican Decision on Law no 391 for the Year 1999 Regarding the Specialized Criminal Court, art. 3; Republican Decision on Law no. 8 for the Year 2004 Regarding the Specialized Criminal Court, art. 1.
[34] Human Rights Watch interviews with Muhammad al-Makhlafi and Muhammad al-Maqtari, lawyers with the Yemeni Observatory for Human Rights, Sanaa, Yemen, December 15, 2008; and with Ahmed Arman of HOOD , Sanaa, Yemen, December 20, 2008. Also see US State Department, "Country Reports on Human Rights Practices – 2008: Yemen," http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2008/nea/119130.htm, sec. e., and Amnesty International, "Yemen: Submission to the UN Universal Periodic Review," http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/asset/MDE31/012/2008/en/28b002a7-b259-11dd-8634-af6d09acdcad/mde310122008en.html, (accessed December 8, 2008), sec. e.
[35]Alice Hackman, "Al-Khaiwani found guilty in a court session he was not informed about," Yemen Times, January 28, 2009, http://www.yementimes.com/article.shtml?i=1229&p=local&a=1 (accessed February 10, 2009); Committee to Protect Journalists, "Yemeni editor given six-year term," June 9, 2008.
[36]Human Rights Watch interviews with al-Makhlafi and al-Maqtari, December 15, 2008, and Arman, December 20, 2008. Also see Amnesty International, "Yemen: Amnesty International Submission to the UN Universal Periodic Review," May 2009, http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/asset/MDE31/012/2008/en/28b002a7-b259-11dd-8634-af6d09acdcad/mde310122008en.html.
[37]The law lists the death penalty for six crimes including heading a kidnapping or theft ring. Draft Law on Countering Terrorism, art. 4. Article 19 would allow the attorney general to authorize wiretaps without a court order. (Copy on file with Human Rights Watch). Human Rights Watch opposes the death penalty in all circumstances because of its inherent cruelty and finality.