US urges Yemen’s Houthis to release local embassy employees

Houthis check weapons on military trucks during a tribal gathering on 1 August 2019 in Sana’a, Yemen [Mohammed Hamoud/Getty Images]

The United States urged Yemen’s Houthi rebels to release an unspecified number of detained Yemeni local employees who work for the US embassy in the capital, Sana’a, the State Department says, Washington Times reports.

According to the report, a spokesperson for the State Department said that a “majority” of the US Embassy staff who were detained have been released and that Washington was engaging in “unceasing” diplomatic efforts to free the security guards still in custody. It is not clear why the Yemeni employees were detained.

Most of the detainees have been released but the rebels continue to hold Yemeni employees of the embassy, the spokesperson added.

Because of Yemen’s civil war, the US transferred embassy operations to Riyadh in 2015.

The United Nations said, last year, that approximately 233,000 people had died as a result of the conflict.

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