Doha: Al Jazeera Media Network yesterday announced the release of Al Jazeera Arabic news team kidnapped in the city of Taiz in Yemen.
Correspondent Hamdi Al Bokari and his crew — cameramen Abdulaziz Al Sabri and driver Moneer Al Sabai — were released yesterday after disappearing 10 days back. The identity of the kidnappers is not clear, but the three were tortured psychologically on four occasions. “We are relieved that our colleagues Al Bokari, Al Sabri and Al Sabai have been released. They were doing their job of reporting the story from the besieged city of Taiz and covering ongoing events in Yemen,” said Dr Mostefa Souag, Acting Director-General, Al Jazeera Media Network.
“It is tragic to see that in times of conflict, journalists continue to be targeted. Journalists should be able to do their work freely and without fear of harm, abduction or unlawful arrest,” he added.
Fighters loyal to Yemen’s President Abdrabbuh Mansur Hadi are battling Iran-allied Houthi militia and loyalists of the country’s former leader in a war that has raged for nine months and in which some 6,000 people have been killed.
Al Jazeera, whose reporting of the 2011 Arab Spring uprisings won it millions of viewers in the Middle East, has seen many of its journalists detained and killed in recent years in conflicts across the region.
Meanwhile, in the southern city of Aden, a suicide car bombing killed at least eight people at a checkpoint outside the presidential palace. The dead included soldiers and civilians and at least 12 were wounded.
The Peninsula & AFP
