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News ID: 72954
Publish Date : 20 November 2019 - 21:42

Yemen's Houthis Release Captured Vessels


SANAA (Dispatches) – Yemen’s Houthi Ansarullah movement has released three vessels and 16 people it had seized, South Korea’s foreign ministry and a Houthi military source in Yemen say.
The seizure on Sunday was the latest incident at sea around Yemen, where Saudi Arabia is leading a war on the country.
Of the vessels freed on Tuesday, two were South Korean and one was Saudi Arabia-flagged, the South Korean foreign ministry said in a statement, adding that the families of two South Koreans among the crew had been notified.
"The three ships were released after the necessary legal measures,” the Houthi military source in Yemen told Reuters, adding that all crew were also released.
On Twitter, Hussein al-Azzi, the Yemeni deputy foreign minister, said the release resulted from friendly ties between Seoul and Sanaa, the Yemeni capital controlled by the Houthis.
A Houthi investigation found the ships had entered Yemeni waters due to bad weather, he added. Earlier, the Houthi coast guard had said the vessels entered Yemeni waters without permission.
The Houthis had announced early on Tuesday that the Yemeni coastguard "is doing its job to determine whether it… belongs to the aggressors or to South Korea.”
"If it is for South Korea, they will be released after legal procedures… we assure everyone not to worry about the crew,” said the chairman of the Supreme Revolutionary Committee of Yemen, Mohammed Ali al-Houthi.
By "aggressors,” he was referring to Saudi Arabia and a number of its regional allies that have been waging war against Yemen since March 2015.
The U.S.-based Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project (ACLED), a nonprofit conflict-research organization, estimates that the Saudi-led war has claimed more than 91,000 lives over the past four and a half years.