Aid group says hospital hit during Houthi attack in Yemen

Doctors Without Borders, also known as MSF, says its hospital opened in August last year, offering free services to war-wounded people and surgeries. (AFP)
Updated 07 November 2019
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Aid group says hospital hit during Houthi attack in Yemen

  • Doctors Without Borders, also known as MSF, says its hospital opened in August last year

SANAA: An international medical relief agency says a hospital it runs in Yemen was damaged by a missile and drone attack. Yemeni military officials blame the attack, which targeted nearby buildings, on the Houthi militia.
In a statement Thursday, Doctors Without Borders said there were no reports of deaths or injuries among its patients at the hospital, located in the Red Sea city of Mocha.
Wadah Dobish, a spokesman for Yemen’s internationally recognized government, said the Houthi attack struck warehouses used by a government-allied force late Wednesday. He says the attack killed eight people and caused a huge fire.
Doctors Without Borders, also known as MSF, says its hospital opened in August last year, offering free services to war-wounded people and surgeries. MSF says the attack forced it to shut down.

The Yemeni government has been battling the Houthis since 2015 after the Iran-allied militia took control of the capital.

However, war appeared to take a drastic turn in August when the anti-Houthi alliance reached a breaking point after pro-separatists forces clashed with the Yemeni army. 

Tensions eased after Saudi Arabia broked a landmark power-sharing deal between the warring factions, calming decades of internal friction in south Yemen

 


Two Tunisia columnists handed over three years in prison

Updated 23 January 2026
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Two Tunisia columnists handed over three years in prison

  • Mourad Zeghidi and Borhen Bsaies have already been in detention for almost two years
  • They were due to be released in January 2025 but have remained in custody on charges of money laundering

TUNIS: Two prominent Tunisian columnists were sentenced on Thursday to three and a half years in prison each for money laundering and tax evasion, according to a relative and local media.
The two men, Mourad Zeghidi and Borhen Bsaies, have already been in detention for almost two years for statements considered critical of President Kais Saied’s government, made on radio, television programs and social media.
They were due to be released in January 2025 but have remained in custody on charges of money laundering and tax evasion.
“Three and a half years for Mourad and Borhen,” Zeghidi’s sister, Meriem Zeghidi Adda, wrote on Facebook on Thursday.
Since Saied’s power grab, which granted him sweeping powers on July 25, 2021, local and international NGOs have denounced a regression of rights and freedoms in Tunisia.
Dozens of opposition figures and civil society activists are being prosecuted under a presidential decree officially aimed at combatting “fake news” but subject to a very broad interpretation denounced by human rights defenders.
Others, including opposition leaders, have been sentenced to heavy prison terms in a mega-trial of “conspiracy against state security.”
In 2025, Tunisia fell 11 places in media watchdog Reporters Without Borders’ (RSF) World Press Freedom Index, dropping from 118th to 129th out of 180 countries.