With hugs and kisses, family and friends of a Yemeni actor celebrated Monday after he and at least three other detainees were freed from prisons controlled by the United Arab Emirates in southern Yemen where they had been held without charges for nearly a year.
The actor, Nasser al-Anbari, a well-known comedian who appeared in TV shows and online videos, grinned and waved as he walked among the well-wishers in the southern city of Aden and motorists honked their car horns, a video filmed by his family shows.
“I couldn’t believe my eyes. I was filming him while in disbelief,” said one of al-Anbari’s sons. When al-Anbari met with his wife, who has cancer, “the two wept,” the son said, speaking on condition of anonymity out of security concerns.
The release on Monday came days after The Associated Press revealed that hundreds of Yemeni prisoners swept up in anti-terror raids by Emirati-backed forces have been subjected to torture and sexual abuse. In Aden’s Beir Ahmed prison, where al-Anbari was held, hundreds of inmates were forced to undress and Emirati officers searched their anal cavities March 10, claiming to be looking for contraband cellphones.
At least three others were also freed from various Emirati-linked facilities. One was an elder called Mahmoud al-Baydani, who used to work for the International Committee of the Red Cross to help mediate releases of hostages held by al-Qaida. He had been held at Beir Ahmed and another UAE-controlled prison in Buriqa. One of the others was held in a lockup in the house of Aden’s Emirati-backed security chief Shalal…
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