![Journalists and mourners lift placards and banners in Taez during the funeral of TV reporter Adib al-Janani, who was killed in a Houthi attack on Aden airport on January 2, 2021. [Ahmad al-Basha/AFP]](/cnmi_am/images/2023/01/12/40266-yemen-press-freedom-700_496.webp)
Three Yemeni YouTubers on Wednesday (January 11) stood trial in a Houthi-controlled court, charged with spreading misinformation and inciting "chaos", in a move observers described as an attack on their freedom of speech.
The three influential men -- Ahmed Hajar, Mustafa al-Mawmari and Ahmed Elaw -- were detained in Sanaa in December after they published videos critical of the Houthis.
Among them they have hundreds of thousands of subscribers on the popular social media platform.
Al-Mawmari has more than two million followers on YouTube, Elaw has more than 800,000 subscribers and Hajar has more than 243,000.
The three were charged with "spreading misinformation" and "harming public interest", as well as "inciting the masses to commit acts of chaos", according to court documents.
It was not clear when a verdict would be issued.
Yemeni government officials have repeatedly stressed that Houthi-controlled courts have no legal authority, as the Iran-backed militia seized control of state institutions from the government after a September 2014 coup in Sanaa.
For this reason, Yemeni Deputy Minister of Human Rights Nabil Abdul Hafeez has said, "any decision issued by them is null and void".
'Robbing the people'
Hajar, 43, was the first to be captured after he accused the Houthis of "robbing the Yemeni people", in a video watched by half a million viewers.
The last upload on his YouTube channel, on December 22, was a 10-minute video criticising corruption in the Houthi-controlled areas of northern Yemen, Al-Jazeera reported Wednesday.
"On the same day, Hajar was dragged into a bus in broad daylight on a busy street," the media outlet reported. "Witnesses said armed individuals, believed to be Houthi rebels in control of the city, had snatched him."
One of Hajar's relatives confirmed his arrest to AFP and said that "he was kidnapped from the street on December 22".
Hajar's family visited him in detention and found him in "terrible shape", the relative said, speaking on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals.
"He was not himself," the relative added.
Houthis limit freedoms
The Houthis have frequently targeted individual liberties, including free speech and the movement of women in areas they control.
The Yemeni Network for Rights and Freedoms documented 1,444 violations committed by the Zainabiyat Battalion, the female military wing of the Houthis, between December 2017 and October 2022.
In a November 10 report, the network detailed numerous cases in which women have been attacked and their rights have been violated.
Cases include arbitrary detention, sexual assault, beatings, torture, facilitation of rape in secret detention centres, prosecution of woman activists and assault on female participants in sit-ins held in some Houthi-controlled provinces, it said.
The Houthis also have been accused of deliberately targeting journalists and media institutions in order to silence witnesses to their crimes against civilians.
