A source in the Congress Party told ‘Sputnik’ that a security force affiliated with Ansar Allah intercepted the car of the party’s Secretary-General, Ghazi Ahmed Al-Ahoul, in central Sanaa and took him to an unknown location. The source added that Al-Ahoul was arrested while he was on his way to the home of the party leader Sadiq Amin Abu Ras.
A leader in the Congress Party told ‘Sputnik’ that the decision to cancel the anniversary celebrations was due to pressure from the Ansar Allah group, which considers any political movement by the party in its controlled areas as unacceptable and threatening its political dominance.
The tension between the two sides dates back to the clashes that took place in Sanaa and several northern provinces in early December 2017, which ended with the killing of former Yemeni president and Congress Party founder Ali Abdullah Saleh, the party’s Secretary-General Arif Awad Al-Zouka, and about 240 others, with over 400 injured according to the United Nations. Ansar Allah also arrested about 2,000 leaders and activists from the party, which was led by Saleh since its founding in 1982 until his death.
The Arab country has been suffering for the tenth consecutive year from a continuous power struggle between the internationally recognized government and the Ansar Allah group, which has had repercussions on various aspects, causing a humanitarian crisis described by the United Nations as one of the worst in the world. The ongoing war in Yemen, until late 2021, has claimed the lives of 377,000 people and caused cumulative losses of $126 billion to the Yemeni economy. About 80 percent of the population, approximately 35 million people, now need humanitarian assistance according to UN reports.
