Yemeni Official: Houthi Mines Disaster Will Last Decades

Houthi mines removed by the Masam project in Yemen. (Saba)
Houthi mines removed by the Masam project in Yemen. (Saba)
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Yemeni Official: Houthi Mines Disaster Will Last Decades

Houthi mines removed by the Masam project in Yemen. (Saba)
Houthi mines removed by the Masam project in Yemen. (Saba)

Director of Yemen's National Mine Action Program, Brigadier General Amin Al-Aqili accused the Iran-backed Houthi militias of continuing to plant mines in the war-torn country, saying the disaster they have created will take decades to resolve.

The Houthis have continued to plant the explosives in spite of the ongoing nationwide truce, he added, while noting that government estimates that the militias have planted over a million mines in Yemen.

He reiterated the call on the international community to pressure the Houthis to stop this malicious activity and hand over maps of where they planted the mines.

He stressed that the Houthis are systematically planting the mines and have accurate maps of their locations.

Moreover, the militias are still locally manufacturing the explosives, the parts of which are being smuggled from Iran, Aqili remarked.

Furthermore, he warned that the recent flooding in Yemen had displaced mines, urging citizens to exercise caution and inform authorities if they come across any suspicious object.

The floods have displaced mines in several regions in the Marib, Jawf, Shabwah, Taiz and Dhale provinces.

Aqili said efforts are ongoing to rid Yemen of the mines. Such work does not get suspended during a truce or peace, he added.

The threat of the mines will remain for dozens of years, even if the war were to end and the Houthis were to stop planting them, he lamented.

He hailed the efforts of Saudi Arabia’s Masam project that is dedicated to removing the mines.

Masam dismantled, during the third week of August, a total of 921 mines planted by the Houthis across Yemen, including 51 anti-personnel mines, 276 anti-tank mines, 590 unexploded ordnance and four explosive devices.

It has dismantled a total of 354,857 mines that have been arbitrarily planted by the militias.



Sudan PM Vows to Rebuild Khartoum on First Visit to War-torn Capital

Kamil Idris, a former UN official who was appointed in May as prime minister by Sudan's leader Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, addresses people and local fighters supporting the Sudanese army who came to cheer him on, during a visit in Omdurman on July 19, 2025. (Photo by Ebrahim Hamid / AFP)
Kamil Idris, a former UN official who was appointed in May as prime minister by Sudan's leader Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, addresses people and local fighters supporting the Sudanese army who came to cheer him on, during a visit in Omdurman on July 19, 2025. (Photo by Ebrahim Hamid / AFP)
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Sudan PM Vows to Rebuild Khartoum on First Visit to War-torn Capital

Kamil Idris, a former UN official who was appointed in May as prime minister by Sudan's leader Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, addresses people and local fighters supporting the Sudanese army who came to cheer him on, during a visit in Omdurman on July 19, 2025. (Photo by Ebrahim Hamid / AFP)
Kamil Idris, a former UN official who was appointed in May as prime minister by Sudan's leader Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, addresses people and local fighters supporting the Sudanese army who came to cheer him on, during a visit in Omdurman on July 19, 2025. (Photo by Ebrahim Hamid / AFP)

Sudan's Prime Minister Kamil Idris on Saturday pledged to rebuild Khartoum, ravaged by more than two years of war, as he made his first visit to the capital since assuming office in May.

Touring Khartoum's destroyed infrastructure earlier, the new premier outlined mass repair projects in anticipation of the return of at least some of the over 3.5 million people who fled the violence, AFP reported.

"Khartoum will return as a proud national capital," Idris said, according to Sudan's state news agency.

Sudan's army chief and de facto leader Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, who appointed Idris, landed Saturday at Khartoum's airport, recaptured by the army in March after nearly two years of occupation by their rival paramilitary Rapid Support Forces.

The war between the Sudanese army and the RSF began in the heart of the capital in April 2023, quickly tearing the city apart.

Tens of thousands are estimated to have been killed in the once-bustling capital, and reconstruction is expected to be a herculean feat, with the government putting the cost at $700 billion nationwide, with Khartoum alone accounting for around half of that.

The army-aligned government, which moved to Port Sudan on the Red Sea early in the war and still operates from there, has begun to plan the return of ministries to Khartoum even as fighting rages on in other parts of the country.

Authorities have begun operations to properly bury the bodies still missing around the city, clear thousands of unexploded ordinance and resume bureaucratic services.

On a visit to Sudan's largest oil refinery, the Al-Jaili plant just north of Khartoum, Idris promised that "national institutions will come back even better than they were before".

The refinery -- now a blackened husk -- was recaptured in January, but the facility which once processed 100,000 barrels a day will take years and at least $1.3 billion to rebuild, officials told AFP.

Cabinet stumbles

The UN expects some two million people will return to Khartoum this year, but those coming back have found an unrecognizable city.

The scale of looting is unprecedented, aid workers say, with evidence of paramilitary fighters ripping copper wire out of power lines before they left.

Vast areas of the city remain without power, and the damage to water infrastructure has caused a devastating cholera outbreak. Health authorities recorded up to 1,500 cases a day last month, according to the UN.

"Water is the primary concern and obstacle delaying the return of citizens to their homes," Idris said on Saturday.

A career diplomat and former UN official, Idris is building a government that critics warn could put up a veneer of civilian rule, in addition to facing challenges within its own camp.

In 2020, during a short-lived transition to civilian rule, the government in Khartoum signed a peace agreement with Sudanese armed groups, allocating a share of cabinet posts to signatories.

All but three cabinet posts are now filled, and armed groups currently fighting alongside the army have retained their representation in Idris's government.

But reports that Idris had sought to appoint technocrats in their place have created tensions.

Some of the armed groups, known together as the Joint Forces, have been integral in defending North Darfur state capital El-Fasher, which has been besieged by the paramilitaries since May of last year.

If the RSF succeeds in taking El-Fasher, it will control all of the vast western region of Darfur, cementing the fragmentation of the country.

Despite the army securing the capital, as well as the country's north and east, war still rages in Sudan's west and south, where the RSF is accused of killing hundreds of civilians in recent days.

Sudan is suffering the world's largest hunger and displacement crises, with nearly 25 million people in dire food insecurity and over 10 million internally displaced across the country.

A further four million people have fled across borders.