| Submit your comments on this article |
| Arabia |
| Yemen to release 112 al-Qaeda, 176 al-Houthi hard boyz |
| 2004-11-04 |
| The government is planning to release about 112 al-Qaeda suspects and 176 Believing Youth, prisoners who have not been charged with any criminal acts, said Judge Hamoud Al-Hitar, head of the Intellectual Dialogue Committee last Tuesday. Al-Qaeda and the Believing Youth are two prohibited organizations in Yemen. The prospective released prisoners have undergone the latest dialogue round that had started at the beginning of last week. They were convinced with the arguments of the committee members and decided to come back to the right path. President Saleh had announced that some 264 detainees were freed in previous dialogue rounds are now practicing their life as good citizens. He also promised that some 1,758 prisoners over different charges would be released soon. He said the government has paid large sums of money for those who failed to pay. The president said that there is no prisoner of opinion in Yemeni prisons, ignoring the case of Abdulkarim Al-Khaiwani, who is being imprisoned for articles published in his newspaper. The president considered Al-Khaiwani as an inciter of insurgency and not a prisoner of opinion. Well-informed sources say that some prisoners the committee had ordered to be released are still imprisoned. |
| Posted by:Dan Darling |