On Friday, the Saudi-led coalition said it had transferred more than 100 released prisoners to Yemen, in coordination with the International Committee of the Red Cross, as part of a humanitarian initiative to support a UN-brokered truce.

The International Committee of the Red Cross announced that it had completed on Friday the process of returning 117 detainees from Saudi Arabia to Yemen, and the coalition also reported the departure of two planes to Aden and Sanaa to hand over the prisoners as part of the mentioned humanitarian initiative.

The coalition confirmed the transfer of 208 prisoners to Aden and 9 to Sana'a, in addition to 9 foreign fighters who were handed over to the embassies of their countries.


Houthi rejection

A Yemeni government official told Reuters that the Houthis refused to receive the prisoners who were transferred to Aden.

The coalition announced last month that it would release 163 prisoners from the Houthi group, but a Houthi official later said that the list included individuals who do not belong to the group.

A member of the Supreme Political Council of the Houthi group, Muhammad Ali al-Houthi, said that Saudi Arabia and its allies did not abide by what was agreed upon, and said that he condemned the failure to release the prisoners who had been agreed to exchange for them.

Al-Houthi called on Saudi Arabia to release all its Yemeni prisoners, saying that some scenes on the communication sites showed the cruelty of dealing with them.

For its part, the Houthi group’s Prisoners and Detainees Committee said that the number of prisoners released from Saudi Arabia is 126, not 163, as contained in the International Committee of the Red Cross’s statements.

She explained that among the released are 5 prisoners of war and 4 fishermen kidnapped from the Red Sea, and the rest are unknown names from the Houthi side.


Interviews with detainees

As for the International Committee of the Red Cross, it said that its teams interviewed the detainees before leaving their detention center in Saudi Arabia, and confirmed their identities and verified their health status and their desire to return to Yemen.

The warring parties in Yemen agreed to a two-month truce that began on April 2, the first major breakthrough in years as part of a United Nations-led effort to end the war that has killed tens of thousands and caused a severe humanitarian crisis.

The parties also discussed a possible prisoner exchange under the auspices of the United Nations, including 1,400 Houthi prisoners and 823 coalition prisoners, including 16 Saudis.

The last major prisoner exchange between the two sides was in 2020, and it involved about 1,000 detainees.