Asaleh City Building - Taiz

After taking control of Taiz in 2014, Ansar Allah (Houthis) designated 20 buildings in the city of Al-Saleh as prisons and places of  torture. These locations are still used as prisons and places of detention were violations against human rights happen. 

The City building was first established in 2007, but was not completed as the Houthis used it as a prison in 2015. Originally, it was designed as a residential city with the purpose of housing some of the youths from Taiz during the rule of former/late president, Saleh. However, the project was not completed due to the Houthi militia’s coup.

It contains 860 residential flats, but serves now both as a permanent detention centre and a temporary detention centre where detainees being transferred to Dhamar or Sanaa or other areas are kept. The Houthis hold nearly 4,000 detainees and abductees, dozens of whom have been released after torture, including three who died days after their release because of torture. The Houthi militias continue to use the site as a detention facility while using part of it to provide sectarian courses to both prisoners and supervisors or to those whom the militia blackmails and exploits. They often detain those who refuse to support or how loyalty to them as well as a number of civilians and political activists.

It is to be noted that the site and the buildings which are supposed to form the planned city of Saleh are invisible on Google Earth maps.