(AhlulBayt News Agency) - Advocacy Director for the Middle East and North Africa at Amnesty International Philip Luther said on Wednesday that the Saudi mercenaries are stationing fighters and military positions near medical facilities.
"By positioning fighters and military positions near medical facilities they have compromised the safety of hospitals and flouted their obligation to protect civilians under international law," he said.
Luther said the Saudi-backed militants are also harassing medical staff and preventing doctors from carrying their work.
"Attacks targeting health professionals or medical facilities are prohibited by international humanitarian law and can constitute war crimes," he said.
Saudi Arabia is waging a destructive war in Yemen in order to restore Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi to power. Hadi has been living in Riyadh since he resigned as president and fled the capital Sana’a in March last year.
Saudi Arabia and its mercenaries have already been accused of gross human rights violations in Yemen, including repeatedly attacking hospitals and civilians.
In its Wednesday report, Amnesty cited cases in which hospitals were shut down because of threats against staff by Saudi-backed forces.
In one incident on 21 November, the militants closed the biggest medical facility of al-Thawra in Tai'zz apparently after hospital staff treated three injured Ansarullah fighters.
"According to eyewitnesses three armed men stormed an office at the hospital and threatened to kill medical staff if it was not shut down immediately," the rights group said.
Hadi Loyalists also tried to drag two surviving Ansarullah fighters out of intensive care and recovery units, Amnesty said, calling it "outrageous and unacceptable."
Doctors told Amnesty International that if pro-Hadi forces were turned away due to lack of capacity at the hospital in some cases they turned violent or abusive," the organization said.
"In other cases, medical staff said that doctors were forced to carry out their work at gunpoint," it added.
According to one doctor, one militant opened fire inside the al-Jamhouri hospital’s compound after being told his son did not require emergency care and could be treated by a nurse. The gunfire injured hospital staff and killed a patient.
Amnesty quoted an administrative work as saying that pro-Hadi militants had threatened medical staff and interfered with the hospital’s administration and its decision-making "hundreds of times".
"When we stand up to them, they threaten us with being killed," the unnamed worker said.
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