SW News: A scary picture has emerged from Yemen where nearly 2,000 children recruited by Houthi rebels in Yemen were killed on the battlefield between January 2020 and May 2021, says a UN report.

In the annual report to the Security Council, UN experts said that 1,406 children recruited by the Houthis between the age of 10 and 17 were killed in various battles in 2020. Another 562 were killed between January and May of 2021. The total number of child casualties since the beginning of the war in 2015 has reached 10,000 so far.

In the 300-page report submitted on Saturday, the UN experts said that the Houthi rebels, who control the capital Sanaa, recruit children through summer camps and indoctrinate them through mosques. While many children are captured from their homes, many families are threatened with blockage of humanitarian aid if they do not hand over their children.

The children captured by the Houthis from the age of seven are taught to clean weapons and evade rockets. “The children are instructed to shout the Houthi slogan ‘death to America, death to Israel, curse the Jews, victory to Islam,” said the four-member panel of experts.

The conflict in Yemen has reached its seventh year and it has caused a humanitarian crisis in the Middle Eastern country. Some 16.2 million people, about 45 per cent of the total population of the country, face food insecurity. More than five million people are on the brink of famine while 50,000 others are living in famine-like conditions, reported World Food Programme (WFP).