4th October, 2018
PHOTO: BBC
Houthi rebels have released two sons of former Yemeni president, Ali Saleh, the rebels and Jordanian media said on Wednesday.
Salah and Madeen Ali Saleh were allowed to board a UN plane in the capital Sana’a, which is controlled by Houthi forces, and were heading to Amman, Jordan’s Hala Akhbar news website reported.
Saleh’s sons were released after a pardon by Mahdi al-Mashat, the head of the Houthis’ political council.
A rebel source said that the release came courtesy of mediation by Oman, a Gulf country which has remained neutral in the conflict that has raged across Yemen since 2015.
Hala Akhbar, which is affiliated with the Jordanian military, reported that the two men “will arrive in Amman in a few hours after their transfer from Sana’a was facilitated.”
“Saleh’s sons were transferred on a UN plane after the coalition issued the required permits,” the website reported, quoting diplomatic sources.
They will transit in Jordan for few hours before heading to an unspecified third country, it added.
Salah and Madeen have been in custody since the Iran-backed Houthis killed Saleh, once their ally, in December 2017.
The former president ruled Yemen for more than three decades before being forced to step down in 2012 in the midst of the Arab Spring.
In late 2014 he had formed a surprising alliance with the Houthis after their takeover of the capital in late 2014, then shifted allegiances to the Saudis shortly before he was killed.
Yemen has been embroiled in a devastating power struggle between the Saudi-backed government and the Houthi rebels for almost four years.
The conflict resulted in the closure of Sana’a airport to commercial flights in August 2016.