Report to the Security Council: There is no evidence of the death of the Houthi leader, Sultan Zabin
English - Sunday 30 January 2022 الساعة 06:17 pm
Aden, NewsYemen:
The Group of Eminent International Experts on Yemen said it had not yet received any evidence of the death of Houthi leader Sultan Zabin, director of the Criminal Investigation Department in Sanaa.
The UN Security Council included Zabin, on the sanctions list, on February 25, for his involvement in heinous violations that affected hundreds of women and girls kidnapped in secret prisons of the Houthi militia.
On April 5, 2021, the Houthi Ministry of Interior announced the death of Sultan Zabin "due to a terminal illness", according to its claim.
In December 2020, the US Treasury imposed sanctions on five leaders of the Houthi group, including Sultan Zabin, and last February the name "Zaben" was placed on a sanctions list that includes Yemeni figures, including Houthi leaders.
On the side of civil violations and repression, the group of experts confirmed that the Houthi militias use sexual violence against women opposing them on the one hand and against children who are also being recruited, and a number of cases have been recorded in which the group has proven and escalated their practices in light of impunity.
The report said that the team documented nine cases in which the Houthis detained politically or professionally active women who opposed their views, and tortured, mutilated and sexually abused them.
The Houthis also continued to use allegations of "prostitution" against detained women in order to strip them of community support and prevent their active participation in society again.
Sultan Zabin, who hails from the "Razeh" district in Saada governorate, the stronghold of the Houthis, in northern Yemen, is one of the militia's senior security officials involved in heinous violations against the kidnapped women in the militia's prisons in Sana'a.
He played a prominent role in campaigns of intimidation, systematic kidnappings, detention, torture and sexual violence against hundreds of Yemeni women in Sana'a.
He was trained by the Revolutionary Guards in Iran and was trained by experts in Hezbollah in Lebanon between 2011 and 2013, and established the Zainabiyat apparatus - a secret security apparatus run by women and undertakes security, military and logistical spying tasks - after hundreds of people were subjected to ideological, security and military training courses for the loyalists. The Houthis and women who believe in the group’s ideological ideology before handing over the duties of its administration to some wives of the Houthi leaders, some of whom are his relatives.
International and local human rights organizations have explicitly revealed his involvement in the kidnapping and torture of girls, female students and women, and his transformation of 9 civilian buildings on the outskirts of Sanaa into secret prisons for kidnapped women.
